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 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Give me to learn each secret cause; 
 Let numbers, figures, Nature's laws, 
 
 Reveal'd before me stand : 
 Then to great Nature's scenes apply, 
 And, round the globe, and thro' the sky, 
 
 Disclose her working hand.' 
 
 Akenside. 
 
Plato? byBegretti ' 
 
NATURE-STUDY; 
 
 THE ART OF ATTAINING THOSE EXCELLENCIES IN 
 
 POETRY AND ELOQUENCE 
 
 WHICH 
 
 ARE MAINLY DEPENDENT ON THE MANIFOLD INFLUENCES OF 
 
 UNIVERSAL NATURE. 
 
 BY 
 
 HENRY DIRCKS, C.E. LL.D. F.R.S.E. M.R.S.L. 
 
 AUTHOR OF ' LIFE OF THE MARQUIS OF WORCESTER,' ' LIFE OF SAMUEL HARTLIB," ETC. 
 
 Parcus Decorum cultor, et infrequens, 
 Insanientis dum sapientiae 
 Consultus erro ; nunc retrorsum 
 Vela dare, atque iterare cursus 
 Cogor relictos — 
 
 Horace. 
 
 LONDON : 
 E. MOXON, SON & CO., 44, DOVER STREET, W. 
 
 1869. 
 

 60501 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 SWIFT & CO., REGENT PRESS, KING STREET, 
 
 REGENT STREET W. 
 
TO 
 
 RICHARD MONCKTON, BARON HOUGHTON, 
 
 ETC., ETC., ETC., 
 OF 
 
 FRYSTON HALL, FERRYBRIDGE, YORKSHIRE, 
 
 Poet, Philosopher, anil statesman* 
 
 THE MODERN 
 
 MEC^ENAS OF LITERATURE; 
 
 AND 
 
 ONE OF ITS MOST PROFOUND CRITICS; 
 
 THIS BOOK IS 
 
 DEDICATED BY PERMISSION 
 
 WITH FEELINGS OF THE UTMOST RESPECT AND ESTEEM 
 BY HIS MOST OBEDIENT SERVANT, 
 
 HENRY DIRCKS. 
 
 b 2 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Dedication v 
 
 Preface xi 
 
 Chapter I. • 
 
 Introduction. Human rather than External Na- 
 ture the province of ancient classical, and of 
 old English Poetry ; the vague and conflict- 
 ing opinions of critics on the character, influ- 
 ences, and study of Nature, and consequent 
 absence of any System . . . pp. i — 40 
 
 Chapter II. 
 
 Criticism affords no definite rules in reference to 
 the study of Nature ; Nature as distinguished 
 from Art, includes the entire Creation, animate 
 and inanimate ; various critical opinions ex- 
 amined, especially in reference to Words- 
 worth's philosophy of Nature ; unmeaning 
 language reprobated ; poets best record their 
 own Nature-Study ; the practice of Thomson, 
 Young, Pope, Scott, Coleridge, and Dr. 
 Southey, with illustrations from the latter, 
 and from Wordsworth's Excursion . . 41 — 80 
 
 Chapter III. 
 
 The absence of methodized Nature-Study ; Words- 
 worth's works leave his Philosophy open to 
 dispute ; methodical study insisted on : a 
 study independent of science ; Generalization 
 an important elementary step ; Figurative 
 language ; its indebtedness to Nature ; ex- 
 amples from Prose Writers ; modes suggested 
 for classifying figures from Nature . . 81 — 97 
 
 Chapter IV. 
 
 Proverbs, ancient and modern ; strictures on so- 
 called Proverbial Philosophy ; Scripture pro- 
 verbs ; Proverbs from ZBschylus, Sophocles, 
 Euripides, Persian, Turkish, and Afghan 
 
( 
 
 Vlll 
 
 Proverbs ; Shakspeare's proverbs ; Ray's col- 
 lection, &c. ; analysis showing natural objects, 
 &c. employed in the proverbs quoted . pp. 98 — 111 
 
 Chapter V. 
 
 Descriptive Poetry in its first division, as applied 
 to single objects and features ; mere naming 
 or cataloguing censured ; attempt to portray 
 Nature through Art ; design of the examples 
 of poetical practice in description ; Celestial 
 and Terrestrial Nature illustrated by poetical 
 selections ...... 112 — 152 
 
 Chapter VI. 
 
 Descriptive Poetry in its second division, or large 
 and ordinary sense ; Greek and other early 
 poetry not highly descriptive ; Blackmore's 
 Creation; Thomson's Seasons; Darwin's bo- 
 tanical poetry; Burns as a descriptive poet; 
 characteristics of natural scenes, seasons, &c, 
 in illustrative selections from the poets 153 — 174 
 
 Chapter VII. 
 
 Human Nature : an independent and important 
 study ; illustrative poetical examples, phy- 
 sical, metaphysical, ethical, theological, social, 
 and political; Fletcher's Purple Island; general 
 observations ...... 175 — 210 
 
 Chapter VIII. 
 
 Meditative, and religious, moral, or serious poetry ; 
 ancient Hebrew poetry ; the Old Testament ; 
 Wordsworth on universal Nature ; prose ex- 
 amples ; illustrative poetical selections ; re- 
 marks on the adopted arrangement . 211 — 257 
 
 Chapter IX. 
 
 Imagination and Fancy; former poetical illustra- 
 tions generally deficient in both ; Dr. Brown 
 on Imagination ; Professor Bain on Poetical 
 truth ; Imagination and Fancy defined ; poeti- 
 cal conception excels production ; sentiments 
 of Humboldt, and Lord Macaulay ; various 
 illustrative poetical specimens ; remarks on 
 the same ...... 258 — 333 
 
\ 
 
 ( « ) 
 
 Chapter X. 
 
 On Negative views of Nature ; contra-natural and 
 fabulous creatures ; poetical mysticism ; Na- 
 ture as a standard of taste and criticism ; In 
 Memoriam ; Nature and Art ; illustrative 
 poetical specimens of the negative employ- 
 ment of Nature ; remarks on the application 
 of the term negative ; when misused ; its 
 various employment ; Nature-Study still re- 
 quisite . .... pp. 334—365 
 
 Chapter XI. 
 
 Miscellaneous observations ; peculiar applications 
 of Nature ; assimilating literary labours with 
 external appearances in Nature ; religious ap- 
 propriations of Nature ; the unlovely or ugly ; 
 amusing use of platitudes ; truth and fiction 
 in serious compositions ; climate and taste ; 
 concluding remarks .... 366 — 374 
 
 Chapter XII. 
 
 Esthetics must afford rules of Art ; Nature un- 
 erring, creative, and perfect ; Art imperfect ; 
 Nature a mystery ; Beauty a trait of Nature : 
 Nature as studied for Poetry ; retrospect of 
 preceding observations ; mysticism censured ; 
 purely Descriptive Poetry ; Science antago- 
 nistic to poetry ; Dramatic Poetry. Nature, 
 simple in description, and etherealized through 
 Imagination and Fancy ; Generalization and 
 Particularization illustrated ; Nature in re- 
 ference to human passions, sentiments, and 
 other associations ; Shakspeare an eminent 
 instance ; a Common-place book suggested ; 
 subjects for it ; concluding remarks . 375 — 405 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 The once celebrated, and not even now entirely 
 forgotten Imlac, the companion and friend of 
 Rasselas, in the history of his life, declared to 
 the Prince of Abyssinia, while resident in the 
 Happy Valley, that : — 
 
 ' Being now resolved to be a poet, I saw every- 
 thing with a new purpose ; my sphere of atten- 
 tion was suddenly magnified ; no kind of 
 knowledge was to be overlooked, I ranged the 
 mountains and deserts for images and resem- 
 blances, and pictured upon my mind every tree 
 of the forest and flower of the valley. I ob- 
 served with equal care the crags of the rock and 
 the pinnacles of the palace. Sometimes I wan- 
 dered along the mazes of the rivulet, and some- 
 times watched the changes of the summer clouds. 
 To a poet nothing can be useless. Whatever is 
 beautiful, and whatever is dreadful, must be 
 familiar to his imagination ; he must be con- 
 versant with all that is awfully vast or elegantly 
 little. The plants of the garden, the animals of 
 the wood, the minerals of the earth, and meteors 
 of the sky, must all concur to store his mind 
 with inexhaustible variety : for every idea is 
 useful for the enforcement or decoration of moral 
 or religious truth ; and he who knows most will 
 have most power of diversifying his scenes, and 
 of gratifying his reader with remote allusions 
 and unexpected instruction. All the appearances 
 
( xii ) 
 
 of Nature I was therefore careful to study ; and 
 every country which I have surveyed has con- 
 tributed something to my poetical powers.' 
 
 He went on to say : ' The business of a poet 
 is to examine, not the individual, but the species, 
 to remark general properties and large appear- 
 ances : he does not number the streaks of the 
 tulip, or describe the different shades in the 
 verdure of the forest. He is to exhibit, in his 
 portraits of Nature, such prominent and striking 
 features as recal the original to every mind ; and 
 must neglect the minuter discriminations — which 
 one may have remarked and another have neg- 
 lected — for those characteristics which are alike 
 obvious to vigilance and carelessness.' 
 
 1 But,' he adds, ' the knowledge of Nature is 
 only half the task of a poet ;' he must not only 
 study human character and modes of life, but 
 also — c many languages and many sciences ; and, 
 that his style may be worthy of his thoughts, 
 must, by incessant practice, familiarize to him- 
 self every delicacy of speech and grace of 
 harmony. 1 
 
 No wonder that the amiable prince after this 
 exordium should exclaim — l Enough ! thou hast 
 convinced me that no human being can ever 
 be a poet !' 
 
 What the great moralist wrote on this topic 
 in 1759, is as applicable after a lapse of one 
 hundred and ten years as it was when first pub- 
 lished. The study of Nature as represented to 
 have been viewed by Imlac, has received no im- 
 provement. No critic has essayed to refute, 
 correct, or add to his arguments, but all remain 
 
( xiiI ) 
 
 as vague and diversified in their statements on 
 this subject as though it were a hopelessly in- 
 tricate maze. Imlac says of the poet that, c He 
 must write as the interpreter of Nature and the 
 legislator of mankind.' This interpretation is 
 still upheld, and according to not a few we are 
 literally to find — 
 
 tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, 
 
 Sermons in stones, 
 
 It would be out of place to re-open here the 
 subject of the present treatise, but it is important 
 to state briefly its scope and method. 
 
 In the first place, Chapters I. and II. are oc- 
 cupied with introductory and critical remarks 
 principally in reference to the growth of this 
 study, its importance in the present state of 
 literature, the total absence of method in such 
 study, and the perplexing influence of the di- 
 versity of critical opinion expressed by high 
 literary authorities ; showing also how very 
 crude has been the methods of study of which 
 we have been able to glean information. At 
 the same time it is shown that hundreds of 
 volumes have been written professing to en- 
 lighten us on the subject of Nature, without ad- 
 vancing a single available process to attain the 
 desired end. In 1813 was published The Phi- 
 losophy of Nature, 1 2mo, consisting of 664 pages, 
 but in what the philosophy consists it would be 
 difficult to say, unless it be considered the only 
 suitable term for musing about rocks, rivers, 
 islands, pictorial art, and the like, in a number 
 of detached paragraphs without any apparent 
 aim or design. And such is the general disap- 
 
XIV 
 
 pointment on perusing this class of works, that 
 it may have operated on the author of the present 
 work to induce him to keep, if possible, too 
 closely to his text, even to the exclusion from 
 every quotation of the slightest allusion to Art, 
 except where absolutely required to preserve the 
 sense of some particular passage. 
 
 Secondly. In Chapter III. we advance to the 
 ist stage in which the employment of Nature 
 can be said properly to affect language, in meta- 
 phorical forms of expression, and principally con- 
 cerning prose compositions. In Chapter IV. this 
 examination is extended to proverbial construc- 
 tions of language, more largely and picturesquely 
 indebted to the observance of external Nature. 
 
 Thirdly. The poetical series commences with 
 Chapter V., being descriptive of single natural 
 objects ; and in Chapter VI. of such objects 
 compounded, forming complex subjects and 
 scenes. To these, as likewise to each chapter 
 following, some introductory remarks are appen- 
 ded, and each division is illustrated by a variety 
 of poetical selections ancient and modern. 
 
 Fourthly. The Vllth chapter has been devoted 
 entirely to c Human Nature' from its superior 
 character, and the greater devotedness of poets of 
 all ages and climes to its development. Chapter 
 VIII. may be considered as an appropriate adjunct 
 to the foregoing, referring as it does entirely to 
 meditative and other serious forms of poetry. 
 
 I ifthly. The IXth Chapter is wholly engaged 
 with * Imagination and Fancy ; ' and then follow 
 two chapters, one on c Negative views of Nature,' 
 and the other ' Miscellaneous Observations.' 
 
( xv ) 
 
 So far then, we have before us a large collec- 
 tion of illustrative examples of species of Nature- 
 Study, pursued as it may be said solely by 
 natural instinct, or talent, or genius, or through 
 the interposition of a direct inspiration. Be the 
 means what they may, we have here the result, 
 as it were, stereotyped, and may examine at our 
 leisure the mental process that developed without 
 system, what we are desirous of rendering syste- 
 matic. In Chapter XII. this is attempted, and the 
 consistency of the methods proposed may be proved 
 by any one having the ability to apply them in 
 practice. We see how man's association with 
 Nature leads him to mix the mental with the 
 material, to see in his own anger the angry tor- 
 rent, his own fury the furious storm, his own 
 calmness the serenity of summer's evening ; he is 
 as a palm, or as grain, or as w^ater ; his life is as 
 a breath, or a mist, or a dew. 
 
 It is laid down that we must Generalize, to 
 ascertain the substances and qualities of the several 
 portions of the Universe. If we take these as 
 Fire, Water, Earth, and Air, we must again 
 generalize on each of these, until at last we have 
 perhaps gone as far as present knowledge will 
 permit. The next process is to Particularize, 
 which may be carried to an indefinite extent, or 
 limited to special subjects. Lastly, we have to 
 Analyze each of those, so as to connect their 
 minutest associations in respect to all that apper- 
 tains to or can be connected with them. But as 
 in these processes we are dealing first with 
 Nature, to trace its minutest ramifications, with- 
 out any express or premeditated object, there is 
 
XVI 
 
 another mode of studying Nature suggested, as 
 when the primary desire is to find in the 
 material world what will appropriately associate 
 with and illustrate figuratively our ideas of Time, 
 Space, Power, Sublimity, Beauty, Figure, Order, 
 Motion, Light, Life, Colour, Variety, Simplicity, 
 Solitude, Antagonism, and the like, in which our 
 examination of natural objects and phenomena 
 will proceed upon a somewhat similar process, 
 but differently applied. 
 
 The author, speaking from thirty years' expe- 
 rience, feels confident in asserting that he believes 
 the true, conscientious, unfettered student of 
 Nature, largely informed on a variety of subjects, 
 without being deeply read in science, will not 
 have occasion to proceed far in the recommended 
 method of study, without speedily acquiring a 
 vast store of original and novel information ; 
 and for ever discard the visionary and imbecile 
 attempt to expound and imitate Nature in 
 mysteriousness. There is sufficient in Nature 
 still undeveloped by the intelligence of the 
 greatest geniuses from the days of Homer to the 
 present time, to occupy many generations of 
 poets, in objects, features, and phenomena, which 
 Nature unfolds for man's enjoyment and instruc- 
 tion, without his attempting to realize the fabled 
 character of the seer, sorcerer, or astrologer ; an 
 unhappy ambition which never has and never 
 can out-do the broad daylight workings of 
 Nature, in this our sublunary state of being. 
 
 Nature is so vast, so incomprehensibly sub- 
 lime, that it can exist, and hold on its 
 course without deriving the smallest advan- 
 
( xvii ) 
 
 tage from Man's laudation, a remark we are 
 disposed to make in consequence of most 
 writers on this subject adopting an unnecessary- 
 course of almost frantic adulation, as if in excuse 
 for having nothing better to say. Read their 
 works where we will, they are without point, 
 too often without truth, and generally calculated 
 to mislead. We should have no hopes of a 
 reader as a student of Nature, who was wedded 
 to the perverse, narrow, unmeaning views as 
 generally expressed in the most promising vo- 
 lumes respecting the studies, teachings, voices, 
 spirit, and soul of Nature ; works that are neither 
 prose nor poetry, neither wholly sense nor en- 
 tirely without merit, but feeble as the mountain 
 mist and far less profitable. 
 
 Among puerile attempts to enhance Nature, 
 it is not uncommon for the enthusiast to express 
 surprise at the appropriateness of its objects or 
 peculiar features in giving effect to moral senti- 
 ments, ignorant of the simple fact that this very 
 circumstance arises from daily habit and associa- 
 tion. From pages 103 to 1 10, we have given a 
 selection of proverbs all more or less derived 
 from Nature ; but had Art been our object we 
 could have found matters relating thereto as- 
 sociated in like manner with moral and other 
 advice, as : — 
 
 No lock will hold against the power of gold. 
 
 What your glass tells you will not be told by counsel. 
 
 A pound of care will not pay an ounce of debt. 
 
 He lights his candle at_both ends. 
 
 The balance distinguishes not between gold and lead. 
 
 Step after step the ladder is ascended. 
 
 The same observations apply to all strong as- 
 
( xvl ) 
 
 sociations; hence the enthusiasm of those 
 who devote their energies to any special 
 pursuit, giving a charm where otherwise no 
 interest could possibly exist. But time and cir- 
 cumstances may occasion that interest to abate, 
 under certain circumstances, beyond the possi- 
 bility of revival ; and hence we have no longer 
 any devout feelings for heathen deities, or even 
 the so-called druidical remains found in our own 
 country — the age that honoured them, together 
 with its traditions, having departed. 
 
 In the Life and Correspondence of John 
 Foster, 2 vols. i2mo, 1848, occurs the following 
 remark from his Journal: — 'But sweet Nature ! 
 I have conversed with her with inexpressible 
 luxury ; I have almost worshipped her. A 
 flower, a tree, a bird, a fly has been enough to 
 kindle a delightful train of ideas and emotions, 
 and sometimes to elevate the mind to sublime 
 conceptions.' (p. 303.) Now we could have 
 spared this laudation for a few examples of the 
 c delightful train of ideas and emotions.' 
 
 Like many other such writers, Foster observes 
 an c Astonishing number of analogies with moral 
 truth strike one's imagination in wandering and 
 musing through the scenes of Nature' (p. 204). 
 Very true, but not peculiar to Nature. Hence 
 we find in Shakspeare : — 
 
 life is a shuttle. — Merry Wives of Windsor. 
 
 The web of our life is a mingled yarn, good and ill to- 
 gether : Alls Well that ends Well. 
 
 Out, out, brief candle ! 
 
 Life's but a poor player, 
 
 That struts and frets his hour upon the stage, 
 And then is heard no more ; it is a tale. — Macbeth. 
 
XIX 
 
 They found him dead 
 
 An empty casket, where the jewel of life [ta'en away]. 
 
 King John. 
 — now hath time made me his numbering clock: 
 My thoughts are minutes ; and, with sighs, they jar, 
 Their watches to mine eyes, the outward watch, 
 Whereto my finger, like a dial's point, 
 Is pointing still. King Richard II. 
 
 Foster seems to have been a believer in 
 Physiopatby, a faculty of pervading all Nature 
 with one's own being, as it is here explained, so 
 as to have a perception, a life, and an agency in 
 all things. At page 213 of this ' Life ' it is 
 stated that a man possessing this faculty — ' He 
 feels as if he grew in the grass, and flowers, and 
 groves; — he flows in the river, chafes in its 
 cascades, smiles in the aqueous flowers, and 
 frisks in the fishes ; — thereby, in one sense, in- 
 heriting all things.' And, in our estimation, 
 much to be pitied should such an one be without 
 friends to take care of him during such hallu- 
 cinations. 
 
 German transcendentalism indulges in fantas- 
 tical dreams ; even Goethe, whatever he might 
 really think, could say, allusive to his residence 
 at Darnburg, — ' I pass almost the whole day in 
 the open air, and hold spiritual communion 
 with the tendrils of the vine, which say good 
 things to me, and I could tell you wonders.' 
 
 On another occasion he said to Eckermann : 
 c I will confide something to you that will sound 
 odd. The plant goes from knot to knot, closing 
 at last with the flower and the seed. In the 
 animal kingdom it is not otherwise. The cater- 
 pillar and the tape-worm go from knot to 
 knot, and at last forms a head. With the higher 
 
XX 
 
 animals and man, the vertebral bones grow one 
 upon another, and terminate with the head, in 
 which the powers are concentrated. With cor- 
 porations it is the same as with individuals. 
 The bees, a series of individuals, connected one 
 with another, at least as a community, produce 
 something, which is the conclusion, and may be 
 regarded as the head of the whole — the queen 
 bee. How this is managed is a mystery, hard 
 to be expressed, but I may say I have my 
 thoughts about it.' 
 
 Now here we have a plant contrasted with 
 the c caterpillar and tape-worm,' and these again 
 with c animals and man'; and leaving them we 
 have next to c6nsider a colony of ' bees' and 'the 
 queen bee,' to arrive at a philosophical conclu- 
 sion in respect to some analogy assumed to exist 
 between them and any ' corporation,' a body of 
 individuals, such as the lord mayor, aldermen, 
 and common council. We have, however, too 
 high an esteem for Goethe's genius to conclude 
 that we have here a translation precisely con- 
 veying his views on a subject — the study of 
 Nature, the pleasure and consolation of a long 
 and successful literary career. What Pope ex- 
 pressed in reference to a certain class of dark, 
 metaphysical writers, might be well applied to 
 the majority of works treating on Nature — 
 
 So spins the silk-worm small its slender store, 
 And labours till it clouds itself all o'er. 
 
 A recent writer expressing his sentiments in 
 in reference to the power of the poet impressed 
 with a high feeling for, and perception of Nature; 
 and of the influence of his poetry on readers, 
 
( ™ ) 
 
 having a less vivid perception, as thereby the 
 delicate mysteries of Nature come to be unveiled 
 and recognized. And again that — The passion 
 of the poet detects and brings to light the secret 
 analogies between the visible and invisible worlds, 
 and shapes them into song; — and then proceeds 
 to speak of the poet's invocations of Nature in 
 her softest breathings. Is there a word of mean- 
 ing in this prose statement? What are — the 
 delicate mysteries — the secret analogies — invoca- 
 tions of Nature — and its softest breathings ? 
 Such language might pass if poetically expressed ; 
 but in plain prose, meant to enlighten us, as a 
 critic should enlighten his readers on any other 
 subject, how happens it that, on the subject of 
 Nature, each critic writes such nothings as this 
 example affords ? The dignity of Nature de- 
 mands some healthier treatment than is afforded 
 by such sentimentally expressed adulation of its 
 mysteries and secrets. 
 
 As little is to be learned from books concern- 
 ing Nature, if we except such as treat on as- 
 tronomy, geography, natural history, and other 
 kindred branches, the poet is left without any 
 assistance ; and we might well be induced to 
 inquire seriously — Has he, or has he not, any 
 definite mode of studying Nature ? A man of 
 science may content himself with astronomy, or 
 botany, or conchology, to the exclusion of all 
 others. But the poet must be naturalistic and 
 universal ; and however great in astronomy alone, 
 he might fail of securing public estimation. 
 
 Every poet who studies Nature, does so after 
 some plan of his own. Has any one ever asked 
 
( xxii ) 
 
 himself — In what does the study of Universal 
 Nature consist ? How should I study Nature 
 were I a poet ? 
 
 It may appear strange, but on close examina- 
 tion it will be found true, that no methodical 
 c study of Nature ' is on record. There is no 
 standard, no system, no classification, no attempt 
 to ascertain by what means Nature, in its various 
 forms, has been developed in the literary labours 
 of past or present times ; hence the continual 
 lament — 
 
 But there is more than we can see 
 And what we see we leave unsaid. 
 
 Even Wordsworth, ' Nature's High-priest,' 
 significantly observes in his ' Poet's Epitaph,' 
 while extolling the poet's vocation — 
 
 In common things that round us lie, 
 Some random truths he can impart. 
 
 But why 'random' and few, with Nature's 
 c common things ' crowding daily before our 
 eyes ? 
 
 Hitherto, neither Nature nor Art has been 
 considered capable of being so concentrated as to 
 afford an independent study. This statement as 
 affecting the former pursuit can scarcely be 
 thought remarkable, considering the vast extent 
 of Nature's dominions — three kingdoms, animal, 
 vegetable, and mineral, each affording a multi- 
 tude of subdivisions. 
 
 Poetry, above all the fine arts, requires a 
 special and peculiar knowledge of Universal 
 Nature, to be obtained by an entirely different 
 mode of pursuit from that adopted by the 
 philosopher in his investigations. Some critics, 
 
( xxiii ) 
 
 from not being cognizant of this difference, have 
 expressed alarm, lest the progress of physical 
 science should encroach on, and seriously affect 
 the poet's pleasant realms of imagination and 
 fancy, even to the extent of ultimately destroy- 
 ing all fiction and romance ! 
 
 It is obvious that no study of Nature, on how- 
 ever excellent a system, can ever give poetic inspira- 
 tion, any more than rules of art, irrespective of 
 genius, can produce skilled artists; but it is 
 equally true, that a just knowledge of the stages 
 in the progress to great achievements, as exempli- 
 fied in works of genius, whether of poetry or 
 painting, is of paramount importance in enlarging 
 and extending man's fertility of invention, 
 ennobling his productions, and conveying through 
 Art strong impressions of the liveliest charms of 
 external and internal Nature. 
 
 The knowledge of a well-ordered system, 
 although it may serve to constitute an able critic, 
 can never do more for the artist than assist his 
 natural genius and talent ; where these are 
 deficient, no system whatever can elevate medio- 
 crity. And in like manner the founder of a 
 system can rarely claim to have performed more 
 than deducing from the labours of others a key 
 or grammar for future guidance in some particular 
 line of study. The author, therefore, although 
 not himself a poet, hopes that by having 
 classified and arranged a great number and variety 
 of examples, and shown from them the several 
 ways in which universal nature has affected 
 poetic minds at different times and under many 
 shades of circumstances, he has increased the 
 
XXIV 
 
 facilities for future students of the same subject, to 
 an extent which may eventually lead to the estab- 
 lishment of an uniform method of Nature-Study. 
 
 The illustrative poetical extracts offered in the 
 present treatise mainly belong to the several 
 departments and separate headings under which 
 they are placed, but occasionally it will be found 
 that some few might change places, as where 
 they are partly descriptive and imaginative, or 
 meditative; in this respect some licence must be 
 claimed, although the great desire has been to 
 observe an accurate distribution of subjects. Their 
 variety makes them a valuable and useful study 
 in themselves, and will convey more information 
 than an elaborate essay without their aid. And 
 in the arrangement adopted, the desire was to 
 secure facility in any future reference, by simply 
 noting a page and a number. 
 
 The work itself aspires to little more than the 
 dignity of being a grammar on the subject, 
 having no especial doctrines to promulgate, or 
 any marked criticisms to offer on poets, and their 
 compositions generally as poetical productions ; 
 in a few cases only, and for obvious reasons, 
 have occasional criticisms been given, on some 
 conceived objectionable rendering of subjects by 
 distinguished poets, whose example in such re- 
 spects might otherwise lead the unwary astray. 
 
 One point may be deserving of a passing 
 notice ; namely, that Nature is treated through- 
 out in the neuter gender, and not as a deity, as 
 we are speaking of the present material world, 
 and not of the future or spiritual, nor of mind, 
 but of matter only. 
 
( XXV ) 
 
 In conclusion it only remains for the 
 author to acknowledge his indebtedness to the 
 literary stores of the British Museum, and es- 
 pecially to the Collections of Campbell, Palgrave, 
 Dr. Trench, and Wilson ; and among those not 
 named in notices at the foot of the pages, The 
 Naturalist's Poetical Companion, 1852 ; Aytoun 
 and Martin's Poems and Ballads of Goethe, 1 859; 
 The Christian Psalmist, 1826; Woodford's 
 Book of Sonnets, 1841 ; and among Moxon's 
 Miniature Poets, Selections from Tennyson, 1 865. 
 And now in bidding adieu to his labour, 
 although it is an approved saying that ' happy is 
 the man who expecteth little' ; he cannot at the 
 same time help thinking that, far happier is the 
 author who, having ventured on a perilous sea, 
 in the expectancy of adverse and stormy criticism, 
 can nevertheless calmly console himself and re- 
 ceive comfort from the reflection that, whatever 
 may be his short coming in other respects, he has 
 not been wanting in uprightness and honesty of 
 purpose ; and a simple desire to give the world 
 the fruits of some years' experience, research, 
 study, and labour, in a novel though possibly too 
 perilous adventure. 
 
 H. D. 
 
 Upper Norwood, Surrey. 
 31st March, 1869. 
 
NATURE-STUDY 
 
 Chapter I. 
 
 Introduction. — Human rather than External Nature the 
 province of ancient classical and of old English Poetry ; 
 the vague and conflicting opinions of critics on the 
 character, influences, and study of Nature, and conse- 
 quent absence of any system. 
 
 Every sentient being, from the first dawn of 
 intelligence, recognises the existence of mind and 
 matter ; of an inner and an outer world ; or, to 
 adopt the quaint phraseology of the past, a 
 microcosm and a macrocosm. Such acquaintance, 
 however, with mankind and with the universe 
 we inhabit, is of little avail to us, mentally, 
 in the absence of systematic cultivation. It 
 requires, therefore, an educated mind to make 
 any advances in collecting and appropriating 
 scattered facts ; and assorting and analysing the 
 several groups of mental and material subjects 
 that present themselves to daily observation. To 
 ordinary minds all creation is mystery ; to cul- 
 tivated minds there is much that is not quite 
 inexplicable. The very knowledge of a man of 
 science is a mystery to the ignorant multitude ; 
 and consequently, although it is impossible to 
 draw an exact line of demarcation, we should 
 
 B 
 
2 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 nevertheless distinguish as far as possible between 
 the estimation of mysteries derived from sources 
 of ignorance and superstition, and those acknow- 
 ledged as such by men of deep research. It is 
 to the scholar, the man of extensive natural and 
 acquired ability, that society owes its obligations 
 for such classes of study as are comprehended 
 under the general designations of Theology, 
 Ethics, Metaphysics, Law, Fine Arts, Natural 
 History, and other branches of Art and 
 Science. 
 
 To superficial observers there is nothing in 
 external Nature which may not be easily learnt 
 by any man of gifted mind, whose inclina- 
 tions have a tendency that way; and who 
 earnestly seeks by close association to put himself 
 in constant communication with the visible world. 
 And truly our early acquaintance with the gran- 
 deur and loveliness of Nature, its ever-changing 
 seasons, its varied aspects in different climes, and 
 all that can recommend it by day, or render it 
 imposingly solemn by night, goes far to justify 
 such a favourable estimate of Nature's unassisted 
 influences on a sensitive mind like that of the 
 poet. But to those who have never closely 
 considered the subject we might suggest the 
 inquiry, Why should the poet any more than 
 the painter be independent of a systematised plan 
 in such a study of Nature as may cultivate his 
 eye and mind, otherwise left to rove at ran- 
 dom ? The Arts of Painting and of Music are 
 each amenable to rigorous rules; rules derived 
 from great masters, and acknowledged to be per- 
 fectly accordant with Nature. Such systems do 
 
INTRODUCTION. 3 
 
 not create talent, but they direct, improve, and 
 facilitate its progress in whatever its possessor 
 undertakes to perform. That Poetry should have 
 remained so long neglected in the particular 
 matter of Nature-Study excites our regret and 
 surprise ; but that it has been so to the present 
 time renders it only the more necessary to pre- 
 pare the reader's mind, by laying before him, 
 however briefly, a sketch of the past, in refer- 
 ence to the poet's use of Nature in his composi- 
 tions ; and of the conflicting opinions offered by 
 critics in treating of the poet's practice in modern 
 times, when adopting external nature for his 
 subject, or writing under its presumed immediate 
 inspiration. 
 
 Nature, so far as the province of poetry is 
 concerned, may be distinguished into, first- 
 human nature ; and second, — all other created 
 things ; or we might denominate these the 
 Intellectual, and the Material or external world. 
 The poet has always treated of mankind as pre- 
 eminent ; and of other objects in creation as 
 subordinate, not only in themselves, but in re- 
 ference to man himself as their lord and master. 
 Therefore ancient poetry, although it often 
 touches on the sublimities of the universe, 
 rarely dilates on its minor objects and appear- 
 ances. It has been observed as remarkable that 
 Horace, in his Art of Poetry, makes no re- 
 ference whatever to external nature as an object 
 of study, and we infer from that omission that 
 it was considered either too insignificant in itself, 
 or too unimportant to the poet who sought 
 to attain a high order of poetical excellence. 
 
 b 2 
 
4 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Lucretius in his De Nat lira Rerum^ as translated 
 by Creech, professes : — 
 
 I treat of things abstruse, the Deity, 
 The vast and steady motions of the sky ; 
 The rise of things, how curious Nature joins 
 The various seed, and in one mass combines 
 The jarring principles : what new supplies 
 Bring nourishment and strength : how she unties 
 The Gordian knot, and the poor compound dies : 
 Of what she makes, to what she breaks the frame, 
 Call'd seeds or principles ; tho' either name 
 We use promiscuously, the thing's the same. 
 
 Book i. p. 3. 
 
 And consequently his poem places before us in 
 verse the scientific reveries of his period, about 
 the 172nd Olympiad. 
 
 The Georgics of Virgil are conceived in a 
 happier strain, and, as a pastoral poem, that 
 work is unrivalled for its many excellences, but 
 it was long indeed before it incited to ever so 
 remote an imitation. And here we may remark 
 that the description of rural scenery, however 
 graphic, is but the most simple and obvious pro- 
 duction of Nature-Study ; it is but one of the 
 many excellences that may be acquired by the 
 well-informed and acute observer of the features, 
 works, and constitution of Nature. 
 
 In his Biograpbia Literaria, S. T. Coleridge 
 takes occasion to notice, when speaking of the 
 poets of Italy during the 15th and 16th centu- 
 ries, that : — 
 
 The imagery is almost always general ; sun, 
 moon, flowers, breezes, murmuring streams, 
 warbling songsters, delicious shades, lovely dam- 
 sels, cruel as fair, nymphs, naiads, and goddesses, 
 are the materials which are common to all, and 
 
INTRODUCTION. 5 
 
 which each shaped and arranged according to his 
 judgment or fancy, little solicitous to add or to 
 particularise. 
 
 Whether we consider the productions of the 
 epic poets, as Homer, Virgil, or Tasso ; of the 
 dramatists, as Sophocles, Euripides, Corneille, or 
 Racine ; of the lyric poets, as Horace, Malherbe, 
 or Rousseau ; of the satirists, as Juvenal, Persius, 
 Boiieau, or Dryden ; of the writers of comedy, 
 as Aristophanes, Plautus, Terence, or Moliere ; 
 or the works of other distinguished poets in these 
 several departments, we must be impressed with 
 the fact that they have done little towards the 
 poet's advancement in a knowledge of the great 
 world of nature in its diversified aspects, and still 
 less in its many exquisitely beautiful associations. 
 
 Passing to our own literature, we find that the 
 history of early English poetry acquaints us with 
 the fact that, like the drama of the period in its 
 stage appointments, very slight, imperfect scenery 
 sufficed the public taste to realise the subjects 
 and picturesque situations portrayed by the poet 
 for their instruction or amusement. The free 
 use made of natural scenery, producing a com- 
 plete mental picture of particular objects, which 
 conspicuously distinguishes our modern from 
 older poetry and prose fictions, can scarcely be 
 said with truth to date much, if any, before the 
 time of Shakspeare; all anterior to his day 
 was limited indeed in quantity, although each 
 poet, contributing a portion, left to the arduous 
 student some advantages to be derived from 
 accumulated masses of occasional happily sug- 
 gestive lines. It is remarkable, however, that, 
 
6 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 century after century, poets should have pro- 
 ceeded so long and so persistently in studying 
 nature through the poetical writings of accidental 
 observers and prolific copyists, as if too timid to 
 study nature for themselves at her own grand 
 shrine. The consequence has been the institu- 
 tion of an artificial study, as in a gallery of 
 cabinet paintings ; rather than the adoption for 
 themselves of self-reliant views of the universe 
 of nature, in all its freshness of life, and growth, 
 and glory. It would seem as though the atten- 
 tion of the poet had been absorbed by, and be- 
 come attached to, the study of human nature,* 
 to the exclusion of all considerations concerning 
 less noble objects. And truly it is not only a 
 noble but an inexhaustible subject, one which 
 never tires, be the object plebeian or polite ; 
 humble or majestic. There is so much to unfold 
 in the investigation of this microcosm ; and so 
 much to depict in the drama of life, whether 
 actual, or reduced to a mere stage-play, that 
 the poet who successfully describes and faith- 
 fully delineates the whole, will not fail to please 
 his audience, although his rural scenes should 
 chance to fall short of elaborate or exact natural 
 scenery in green hills and daisy-dappled dales, 
 dark forests and gay flowers, or ocean, lake, and 
 rippling stream. 
 
 :;: On this very topic we find it noted in the Conversations 
 with Goethe, from the German of Eckermann, published in 
 1839, that the great poet observed: — 
 
 ' It is natural to man to regard himself as the object of 
 the creation, and to think of all things in relation to him- 
 self, and the degree in which they can serve and be useful 
 to him.' 
 
INTRODUCTION. 7 
 
 It would be needless for our present purpose 
 to attempt a history of poetry, or a criticism of 
 poetical composition : such a course could only 
 serve to amplify without illustrating the main 
 topic under consideration. It is admitted beyond 
 dispute that the free use of external nature in 
 descriptive and other poetry, however observable 
 in the productions of a few distinguished poets 
 of the olden time, of all classes and countries, has 
 remained until of late years a comparatively 
 untracked province. 
 
 In the Welsh Triads, as quoted by Dr. 
 Southey in a note to Madoc, it is stated in re- 
 ference to the poetical character : — 
 
 ' The three primary requisites of poetical 
 genius, are : An eye that can see Nature, a heart 
 that can feel Nature, and a resolution that dares 
 follow Nature.' 
 
 No doubt, without eye, heart, or resolution, 
 little or nothing will be effected; for what 
 can a blind and timorous man expect but a 
 ' slough of despond ' ? Yet surely some prepara- 
 tive is needful, were it only direction as to some 
 educational course to be pursued. The painter 
 must commence his course of study by learning 
 perspective and the elements of drawing ; and 
 the statuary by actually dissecting the human 
 frame. How is the Poet to study Nature ? 
 
 It is curious and interesting to remark how 
 many poets once popular are now forgotten, not- 
 withstanding they appeared to evince sensibility 
 to the grand and beautiful in Nature ; and left 
 in song harmonious and clever compositions in 
 proof of their talent in that particular accom- 
 
8 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 plishment. But have not such versifiers mostly 
 been copyists, whose grace and eloquence have 
 made even what they borrowed appear as their 
 own ? An artist who should be educated ex- 
 clusively through his being engaged in copying 
 the works of approved masters would unques- 
 tionably acquire some tolerable skill in art. And 
 so also it might happen with a mediocre poet, 
 and not without some occasional good effect, if 
 we except the sacrifice of novelty and origin- 
 ality. 
 
 As regards a course of studying Nature for 
 the purposes of poetry, it does not, on a casual 
 consideration of the subject, appear to offer any 
 insuperable difficulties. And such probably 
 might be the case were not the issue so com- 
 plicated as it is, at present, with opinions 
 so adverse as to appear little other than 
 ' darkness visible.' The real difficulty there- 
 fore lies at the very threshold of our inquiry, 
 as we shall better understand after perusing 
 the opinions of commonly approved judges, 
 and carefully considering their conflicting criti- 
 cisms. 
 
 The following views of the subject are derived 
 from a popular source of instruction,* and fairly 
 express prevalent opinions : — 
 
 The poet who would excel in description, 
 should exercise his talents in the judicious selec- 
 tion and picturesque display of small groups, or 
 individual objects, and for this purpose he should 
 draw forth what is valuable, even from the rudest 
 materials ; discriminating, in every surrounding 
 
 * Rees' Cyclopaedia. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 9 
 
 object, those attributes which can be rendered 
 subservient to his art. 
 
 Thomson, it is said, was accustomed to wander 
 whole days and nights in the country ; and in 
 such sequestered walks, he acquired, by the 
 most minute attention, a knowledge of all the 
 mysteries of Nature. These he has wrought into 
 his Seasons, with the colouring of Titian, the 
 wildness of Salvator Rosa, and the energy of 
 Raphael. Mil con appears to have been no less 
 familiar with Nature than Thomson, and equally 
 happy in his portraits of her most pleasing forms. 
 He catches every distinguishing feature; and 
 gives to what he describes such glowing tints of 
 life and reality, that we have it, as it were, in 
 full view before our eyes. How perfect is the 
 image in the following lines ! — 
 
 The swan, with arched neck 
 
 Between her white wings mantling, proudly rows 
 Her state, with oary feet. 
 
 It is important (it is added) that the poet should 
 acquire an extensive acquaintance with science in 
 general, and with the various branches of natural 
 history, that he may not, through mere ignorance, 
 deviate from nature as it actually exists ; never- 
 theless it is not expected, that, on all occasions, 
 he should be restricted within the precise boun- 
 daries of truth, nor indeed is it possible thus to 
 restrain a poetic writer of lively and creative 
 fancy. 
 
 The course of study here recommended is, to 
 wander for ' days and nights in the country,' 
 exercising ' the most minute attention ;' with 
 c a knowledge of all the mysteries of nature ' 
 
I O NATU RE-STUDY. 
 
 for our reward. But this is not all, ' science 
 in general and the various branches of natural 
 history ' are recommended as a useful if not 
 an absolutely necessary adjunct. 
 
 The remaining remarks from the same source 
 are written in much the same spirit : — 
 
 Who can notice the countenance of an ox, 
 without perceiving that it displays meekness, 
 patience, and the most inoffensive disposition, 
 thus described by Thomson, 
 
 And the plain ox, 
 That honest, harmless, guileless animal ; 
 
 and that the eyes of this animal are of no un- 
 usual dimension. Nevertheless, in many versions 
 of Homer, that divine poet, so conversant with 
 zoology, is made to style the artful, proud, and 
 passionate queen of the gods, ' ox-eyed Juno ;' 
 a mistake of the translator's (says the critic) 
 from the want of attention to nature. But 
 Dr. Young has also fallen into an error, more 
 pardonable, in his paraphrase on Job ; because 
 an English poet, who has never seen the croco- 
 dile, might be ignorant that his eyes are remark- 
 ably small. 
 
 Among other vulgar errors of certain poets 
 are noticed : — 
 
 i. The supposition that the fertilizing quality 
 of snow arises from nitrous salts. 
 
 2. The idea of male light being communicated 
 
 by the sun, and female light by the moon, 
 as adopted by Milton. And — 
 
 3. The harmony of the spheres, of which 
 
 Milton has given such a view as wants 
 nothing but philosophical truth to render it 
 
INTRODUCTION. I I 
 
 delightful ; and Pope supposed that it is 
 possible the human ear might have been so 
 constituted, as to have been sensible of it. 
 The poet should, therefore (this critic con- 
 cludes), be well versed in the science of physics, 
 not only because he can seldom deviate from it 
 without injury to his compositions, but because 
 these may derive from it sublimity, embellish- 
 ment, or grace. 
 
 What between wandering about the country, 
 and acquiring an intimacy with natural history 
 and physical science, the poet will have some- 
 thing to exercise his patience in adopting the 
 suggestions thus offered. 
 
 About the year 1 8 1 9 a controversy arose be- 
 tween the Rev. W. L. Bowles, Lord Byron, and 
 others on the opinion the former strongly ex- 
 pressed in a critique on Pope as the poet rather 
 of Art than of Nature. The editor of Camp- 
 bell's Essay on English Poetry says : — Mr. 
 Bowles's position is this, that Pope saw rural or 
 field nature through what Dryden calls the 
 spectacles of books ; that he did not see it for 
 himself, as Homer, Virgil, Chaucer, Shakspeare, 
 and Milton saw it, — as it was seen by Thomson, 
 and Cowper ; that his country nature is by re- 
 flection, cold, unwarming, and dead-coloured ; 
 that he did not make what Addison calls 
 additions to nature, as every great poet has done ; 
 that Dr. Blacklock's descriptive nature is as 
 good, who was blind from his birth ; that Jlocks 
 that graze the tender green in Pope graze 
 audibly in true descriptive writers ; and that his 
 paradise had been a succession of alleys, plat- 
 
I 2 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 formSj and quincunxes — a Hagley, or a Stowe, 
 not an Eden, as Milton has made it. All this 
 is true enough, but its importance has been over- 
 rated. 
 
 True it is (he continues) that imagination, a 
 nobler kind of fancy, is the first great quality of 
 a poet — that when it is found united to all the 
 lesser qualities required, it forms what Cowley 
 calls poetry and sanctity, Mr. Campbell has pro- 
 perly extended and written a defence of Pope, 
 which will exist as long as Eloisa's Letter, or 
 any poem of its great writer. 
 
 Gray, whose scattered touches of external na- 
 ture are exquisitely true, has laid it down as a 
 rule that description , the most graceful ornament 
 of poetry, as he calls it, should never form the 
 bulk or subject of a poem. 
 
 Bowles suggests as a rule that c All images 
 drawn from what is beautiful or sublime in the 
 works of nature are more beautiful and sublime 
 than images drawn from art, and are therefore 
 more poetical.' The argument is of little con- 
 sequence for our present purpose in defining 
 a course of Nature-Study, but it serves to 
 show most clearly how unsettled critics of all 
 classes have been in the expression of their 
 opinions on the subject of Nature in connection 
 with poetical compositions. 
 
 Hans C. Oersted, the author of The Soul in 
 Nature, treats of the Spiritual in the Material, 
 of the relation between natural science and 
 poetry, and on the unbeautiful in nature, among 
 other topics. He says : ' I must repeat, that it is 
 only from the future that we must expect the 
 
INTRODUCTION. 1 3 
 
 comprehensive and poetical application of an 
 insight into Nature. 5 He advocates also the em- 
 ployment of Nature in scientific light, and 
 mentions Goethe as an example of a writer 
 attempting such a method. 
 
 Had it not been (he says) that that great poet 
 entirely misunderstood mathematical physics, 
 perhaps misled by the one-sided manner of 
 representation of certain philosophers, he would 
 probably have done much more for the poetical 
 representation of the views of nature. 
 
 The voluminous writings of Saint Pierre, once 
 exceedingly popular, now seldom find readers. In 
 his Harmonies of Nature, three volumes, ,8vo, 
 he first gives a general view of his subject, then 
 addresses Venus, describes the sky, the sun, and 
 the harmonies of man and animals with plants. 
 He finds thirteen harmonies in the vegetable 
 kingdom, enters into a minute description of 
 corn, of plants, and the moon, and traces re- 
 semblances between flowers and stars. 
 
 Apostrophising Nature he exclaims : — 
 
 Daughters of eternal Wisdom, harmonies of 
 Nature, all men are your children ; they stand 
 perpetually in need of your assistance ; without 
 you they would be naked, wretched, discordant 
 in language, thought, and feeling ; but you call 
 them, by their wants, to enjoyment of every 
 kind ; by their differences, to the necessity of 
 concord; by their weakness, to the acquisition of 
 empire, &c, &c. 
 
 His Studies of Nature, five volumes, 8vo, is 
 arranged on a very comprehensive plan, enume- 
 rating blessings bestowed by Nature, giving an 
 
1 4 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 account of the globe, correspondence between 
 plants and the elements ; and of animals and 
 their relations to the elements. In the fifth 
 portion he treats of man, remarking : — 
 
 We shall observe that his eyes are turned, not 
 towards heaven, as the poets, and even some 
 philosophers allege, but to the horizon ; so that 
 he may view at once the heaven which illu- 
 minates and the earth which supports him. 
 
 Such a stiff-necked and far-seeing creature is 
 man, viewed according to this system. 
 
 As an eleventh study we have a discourse re- 
 lating to ' Human Harmonies of Plants.' After 
 alluding to different herbs, shrubs, and trees, he 
 concludes : — 
 
 c Such, then, are the general dispositions of 
 vegetables upon the earth, relatively to the occa- 
 sion which man had to range over it. The 
 herbage serves as a carpet to his feet ; the shrub- 
 bery as a scaling-ladder to his hands ; and the 
 trees are as so many parasols over his head.* 
 Though this manner of studying the works of 
 Nature (he adds) be now held in contempt by 
 most naturalists, to it, however, shall our re- 
 searches be limited.' 
 
 The poet therefore, would gain little by giving 
 his days and nights to either such ' Harmonies ' 
 or ' Studies,' which, like too many works of pro- 
 mise on such topics of this class, scarcely repay 
 perusal, being made up of ill-arranged, incon- 
 
 * The spirit of Goethe's philosophy avowed, ' The sepa- 
 ration of subject from object, the faith that each creature 
 exists for its own sake, and that cork-trees do not grow 
 merely that we may have stoppers for our bottles.' — Con- 
 versations with Goethe. Boston, 1839. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 1 5 
 
 elusive matter, affording only a kind of literary 
 and scientific gossip. 
 
 Dr. Aikin,* being strongly impressed with the 
 insipidity of the poetry of the 18th century, 
 wrote an essay purposely to instruct the poet in at 
 least one branch of Nature- Study, to excite to the 
 cultivation of natural history in its application 
 to poetry. He was wearied and disgusted with 
 the perpetual repetition of the same images, clad 
 in almost the same language. He also observes, 
 in agreement with Warton, that almost every 
 poet, Thomson excepted, had, in the treatment 
 of rural beauty, copied his images from Theo- 
 critus, without ever looking into the face of 
 Nature; and that this servility of imitation 
 had prevailed more in this than in any other 
 department of poetry. From a review of the 
 poetical style of Eastern poets, bold, ardent, 
 and precipitate ; the celebrated Book of Job ; 
 and Virgil's natural descriptions, he concludes 
 that the accurate and scientific study of Nature 
 would obviate many of the defects usually dis- 
 coverable in poetical compositions. He considers, 
 however, that not every part of Nature seems 
 capable of affording poetical imagery, among 
 which he instances trees, and the vegetable 
 creation ; and he finds the mineral kingdom still 
 more sterile. But in zoology he observes a prin- 
 cipal and unequivocal charm, the animal race in 
 common with man having almost universally 
 somewhat of moral and intellectual character. 
 He therefore greatly admires Virgil for the 
 
 "An Essay on the application of Natural History to Poetry, 
 i2mo. Warrington, 1777. 
 
1 6 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 sublime and vigorous imagination exhibited in 
 the Georgics, the whole of the 4th Book of 
 which is a complete history of the bee. Pliny 
 he considers too, as a naturalist, possessed of all 
 the fire and elevation of a poet. But Thomson's 
 Seasons are represented as superior to the Geoigics, 
 the poet well meriting Pennant's epithet of The 
 Naturalisfs Poet. He also remarks that such 
 is the variety of Nature that we need not be 
 apprehensive of original pictures, even of the 
 same subject, falling into uninteresting sameness ; 
 and notices that, although a single grain of sand 
 is of itself too minute for any purpose of 
 description or comparison, yet c the sands of the 
 sea shore ' form an image of multitude suffici- 
 ently grand and elevated for the highest species 
 of composition. And from all his observations 
 he draws the conclusion that, every scene of 
 Nature, foreign or domestic, affords objects of 
 which an accurate survey may furnish new ideas 
 of grandeur and beauty. 
 
 The sum of Dr. Aikin's recommendation is — 
 Let the descriptive poet study to become a pro- 
 found, or at least a tolerable, zoologist. And 
 having a liking for that pursuit, he does not 
 particularly recommend Botany, Horticulture, or 
 Agriculture : the different orders of plants, to- 
 gether with the characters of the genera and 
 species, need not absorb the poet's lucubrations. 
 But the Acrita, Nematoneura, Homogangliata, 
 Heterogangliata, Yertebrata, &c, of the animal 
 kingdom he must particularly study and closely 
 investigate. If the poet must become a student 
 of science, he clearly must not restrict his obser- 
 
INTRODUCTION. 1 7 
 
 vations to Zoology to the neglect of Astronomy, 
 Geography, Geology, and many other mind- 
 enlarging studies. 
 
 Dr. Aikin's essay is interesting and instructive, 
 so far as it tends to check careless and incorrect 
 descriptions. A work of a similar kind by Dr. 
 R. H. Newell, entitled The Zoology of the 
 English Poets, appeared in 1845, in which are 
 noticed the inaccurate descriptions of the manners 
 and habits of several kinds of birds, insects, 
 reptiles, and mammalia. Fortunately the list of 
 offenders is not very voluminous, but it includes 
 Shakspeare, Spenser, Milton, Dryden, Prior, 
 Watts, Smart, Darwin, Rogers, Churchill, 
 Thomson, Gay, Swift, Waller, Young, Drayton, 
 Collins, Coleridge, Southey, Montgomery, and 
 Sir W. Scott ; — an amount of authority suffi- 
 cient to induce modern poets to rest satisfied with 
 fabulous accounts of the ant ; vague descrip- 
 tions of the bee ; erroneous opinions of blight ; 
 superstitious fancies about the death-watch ; 
 mistakes about the gad-fly ; incorrect notions 
 about the glow-worm ; and so on throughout 
 their versions of what they design to be a veri- 
 table natural history. It is thus that the poet is, 
 and has long been, lectured here a little and there 
 a little, but no system has been presented to 
 him for his regular and diligent study of natural 
 phenomena. 
 
 It has been well observed that all knowledge 
 is available to the poet, and of infinite value to 
 him in the conduct of his compositions ; but the 
 particular knowledge which should take the first 
 and foremost place in his education, giving him 
 
 c 
 
1 8 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 an acquaintance with and ability to acquire and 
 apply instruction derived from the pure fount of 
 Nature itself, is unknown, and has not hitherto 
 been so much as attempted. 
 
 It is remarkable (says Wordsworth in the sup- 
 plement to his preface) that, excepting the 
 Nocturnal Reverie of Lady Winchelsea, and a 
 passage or two in the Windsor Forest of Pope, 
 the poetry of the period between the publication 
 of Paradise Lost and The Seasons does not con- 
 tain a single new image of external nature, and 
 scarcely presents a familiar one from which it 
 can be inferred that the eye of the poet had been 
 steadily fixed upon his object, much less that his 
 feelings had urged him to work upon it in the 
 spirit of genuine imagination. To what a low 
 state knowledge of the most obvious and im- 
 portant phenomena had sunk, is evident from 
 the style in which Dryden has executed a de- 
 scription of Night in one of his tragedies, and 
 that in which Pope has translated the celebrated 
 moonlight scene in the Iliad. A blind man, in 
 the habit of attending accurately to descriptions 
 casually dropped from the lips of those around 
 him, might easily depict those appearances with 
 more truth. Dryden's lines are vague, bombastic, 
 and senseless; those of Pope, though he had 
 Homer to guide him, are throughout false and 
 contradictory. The verses of Dryden, once 
 highly celebrated, are now forgotten ; those of 
 Pope still retain c their hold upon public estima- 
 tion,' nay, there is not a passage of descriptive 
 poetry which at this day finds so many and such 
 ardent admirers. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 1 9 
 
 Dryden describes Night as though — 
 
 Nature's self lay dead ; 
 
 The mountains seem to nod their drowsy head ; 
 The little birds in dreams their songs repeat, 
 And sleeping flowers beneath the night-dew sweat. 
 
 Pope's version of Homer's Moonlight Scene 
 informs us that the stars — 
 
 O'er the dark trees a yellower verdure shed, 
 And tip with silver every mountain's head ; 
 Then shine the vales, and rocks in prospect rise ; 
 
 while swains 
 
 Eye the blue vault, and bless the useful night. 
 
 Dr. Southey, criticising the scene that Pope has 
 so imperfectly described, says : — 
 
 Here are the planets rolling round the moon ; 
 here is the pole gilt and glowing with stars ; 
 here are trees made yellow, and mountains tipped 
 with silver, by the moonlight ; and here is the 
 whole sky in a flood of glory ; appearances not 
 to be found in Homer or in Nature ; finally these 
 gilt and glowing skies, at the very time when 
 they are thus pouring forth a flood of glory, are 
 represented as a blue vault. The astronomy in 
 these lines would not appear more extraordinary 
 to Dr. Herschel than the imagery to every 
 person who has observed a moonlight scene. 
 
 Along with these notices of Wordsworth's and 
 Southey's strictures, appended to Campbell's 
 Essay on English Poetry, 1841, occurs an 
 editorial note to the effect that — 
 
 With Shakspeare it is otherwise: his in- 
 animate nature is unsurpassed for truthfulness 
 and distinct poetical personation. Description in 
 Shakspeare is a shadow received by the ear and 
 perceived by the eye, 
 
 c 2 
 
20 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 ' A shadow received by the ear and perceived 
 by the eye ' is a novelty. Why are we left to 
 guess at a meaning, when something is obviously 
 meant ; why not express it in plain prose ? 
 
 According to Wordsworth and Dr. Southey, 
 the distinguishing fault of Dryden and Pope 
 was their substituting art for nature; and the 
 critiques of both apply solely to descriptive 
 poetry, in which there was an utter deficiency 
 for a period of over seventy-five years, as esti- 
 mated by Wordsworth, poetry being devoid of 
 even ' a single new image ' until the publication 
 of The Seasons, when Nature once more assumed 
 the prerogative to be the poet's goddess. 
 
 On this subject we cannot do better here than 
 direct attention to the observations offered by 
 Wordsworth in his preface, when he says : 
 
 c The powers requisite for the production of 
 poetry are : Firstly, those of Observation and De- 
 scription, ue, the ability to observe with accuracy 
 things as they are in themselves, and with 
 fidelity to describe them, unmodified by any 
 passion or feeling existing in the mind of the 
 describer : whether the things depicted be actually 
 present to the senses, or have a place only in the 
 memory. This power, though indispensable to 
 a poet, is one which he employs only in submis- 
 sion to necessity, and never for a continuance of 
 time : as its exercise supposes all the higher 
 qualities of the mind to be passive, and in a state 
 of subjection to external objects, much in the 
 same way as the translator or engraver ought to 
 be to his original. Secondly, Sensibility — which 
 the more exquisite it is the wider will be the 
 
INTRODUCTION. 2 1 
 
 range of a poet's perceptions, and the more will 
 he be incited to observe objects, both as they 
 exist in themselves and as re-acted upon by his 
 own mind. Thirdly, Reflection — which makes 
 the poet acquainted with the value of actions, 
 images, thoughts, and feelings; and assists the 
 sensibility in perceiving their connection with 
 each other. Fourthly, Imagination and Fancy — 
 to modify, to create, and to associate. Fifthly, 
 Invention — by which characters are composed 
 out of materials supplied by observation, whether 
 of the poet's own heart and mind, or of external 
 life and nature.' 
 
 These five powers, with Judgment, as a final 
 requisite, close this poet's observations ; and it is 
 greatly to be regretted that, except from his 
 poems themselves, we are left without any more 
 clear guide to his own system of studying 
 Nature, supposing he had actually formed one. 
 We gather from his preface that he indicates, 
 as requisites for description, the observance of 
 objects, and reflection to render our acquirements 
 useful : but how actually to study animate and 
 inanimate Nature he never once suggests ; nor 
 have we any reason to believe that any such 
 purpose was contemplated by him. In The 
 Excursion he represents The Solitary complain- 
 ing— 
 
 Of these unimaginative days : 
 
 But he nevertheless enters on those — 
 
 strains of apt discourse 
 
 Which Nature's various objects might supply. 
 
 These are stated to be — 
 
 Birds and beasts, 
 
 And the mute fish that glances in the stream., 
 
2 2 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 And harmless reptile coiling in the sun, 
 And gorgeous insect hovering in the air, 
 The fowl domestic, and the household dog. 
 
 Now it is in vain that the studious reader 
 seeks to be informed about this c apt discourse ; 5 
 discourse which could turn to account for any 
 poetical purpose such objects as those just offered 
 to our notice. Search as we may, we still 
 find ourselves wondering and wandering. And 
 if we seek the aid of commentators, they take 
 such flights that they cannot address us in any 
 other than 'unknown tongues;' we, therefore, 
 listen to them in vain. 
 
 It is not permitted to the critic to construe too 
 rigidly any poetic expression of sentiments and 
 feelings in regard to the wide world of Nature, 
 therefore we must remain in a great measure 
 passive when Wordsworth in Lines written in 
 1798 a few miles above 1 intern Abbey, 
 remarks — 
 
 While with an eye made quiet by the power 
 Of harmony, and the deep power of joy, 
 We see into the life of things : 
 
 and proceeds to state that he is still — 
 
 A lover of the meadows and the woods, 
 And mountains ; and of all that we behold 
 From this green earth ; of all the mighty world 
 Of eye and ear, both what they half create 
 And what perceive ; well pleased to recognise 
 In nature and the language of the sense, 
 The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse, 
 The guide, the guardian of my heart and soul, 
 Of all my moral being. 
 
 This impassioned love of nature (says Henry 
 Taylor*) is interfused through the whole of 
 Wordsworth's system of thought, filling up all 
 
 * Notes from Books. By Henry Taylor, 8vo., 1848. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 23 
 
 interstices, penetrating all recesses, colouring all 
 media, supporting, associating, and giving co- 
 herency and mutual relevancy to it in all its parts. 
 Though man is his subject, yet is man never 
 presented to us divested of his relations with 
 external nature. Man is the text, but there is 
 always a running commentary of natural pheno- 
 mena. In his great work, ' the mind of man ' 
 is, as he announces, c the haunt and the main 
 region of his song ; ' but the mind of man, as 
 exhibited by him, whatever else it may be, 
 hardly ever fails to be the mirror of natural 
 objects, and more or less the creature of their 
 power. 
 
 The vivacity with which he is accustomed to 
 apprehend this power of inanimate nature over 
 the human mind has indeed led him in some 
 cases, we venture to think, too far ; this is, in 
 his poetical licences, or in that particular poetic 
 licence by which sensation is attributed to inani- 
 mate objects — the particular feelings which they 
 excite in the spectator being ascribed to them- 
 selves, as if they were sentient beings ; as — 
 
 The moon doth with delight 
 
 Look round her when the heavens are bare. 
 
 Ye fountains, meadows, hills and groves, 
 Think not of any severing of your loves. 
 
 In The Excursion — 
 
 Ocean and earth, the solid frame of earth, 
 And ocean's liquid mass, beneath him lay 
 In gladness and deep joy. 
 
 Taylor, who was an early critic of Words- 
 worth's poetry in the Quarterly Review, casually 
 observes that it was far from his purpose to re- 
 
24 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 present the poet as impeccable, but rather as one 
 who wrote for posterity, and whose habit of con- 
 templating natural objects in their causative 
 character, he can perceive, may not only make 
 all Nature seem to live in the eyes of the poet, 
 but may also teach the philosopher to penetrate 
 farther into the passive properties of living beings 
 — their properties not only as agents but as 
 objects. 
 
 The opinion expressed in Taylor's critical 
 view of the subject in connection with the 
 external world of matter might, indeed, without 
 a shade of inconsistency, be applied to the power- 
 ful influences which the pyramids, the buried 
 cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum, or the classic 
 ruins of Rome, exercise over our mental constitu- 
 tion. But let us not blindly attribute to rocks 
 and ruins what is alone the inalienable posses- 
 sion of cultivated intellect. 
 
 Confining our observations on Wordsworth 
 entirely to what we find in his poems respecting 
 Nature, we think we may, without incurring 
 the charge of irreverence for his genius, state that 
 he is deficient in the variety of Shakspeare, the 
 terseness of Thomson, and the spirituality of 
 Keats or of Shelley. We admit his bursts 
 of sublimity and beauty, without being highly 
 imaginative ; or, we shall perhaps be bet'er un- 
 derstood if we qualify this last remark by adding 
 that, considering his almost exclusive study of 
 Nature through years of a long life, he has not 
 accomplished much beyond what other poets of 
 the age have realised, who wrote without the 
 same advantages of open country experiences. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 25 
 
 So far as being elaborate in description where 
 other poets have been concise can be accepted as 
 a recommendation, he most assuredly excels ; 
 but for any special mark of originality due to 
 his individual acquaintance with, and observa- 
 tion of, Nature, it would be difficult to adduce 
 striking examples; nor can we find in the 
 criticisms of his most devoted admirers other 
 offers of proof than such as present comparativelv 
 meagre results, when we consider the laborious 
 nature of the process by which they must have 
 been produced. Now although the effect of 
 majesty is to elevate the mind, there is no abso- 
 lute occasion for the small or minute to lessen its 
 perception and production of beauty. It would 
 seem, indeed, as if Nature, however apparently 
 rude and rough in much that is sublime in its 
 landscapes, yet descends in its microscopic pro- 
 ductions to a marvellous degree of perfection in 
 forms of animate and inanimate matter. Minute- 
 ness, littleness, smallness, generally offend under 
 Wordsworth's treatment. In his poem To the 
 small Celandine, undoubtedly intended to be a 
 most finished piece, addressed as it was to the 
 flower of his adoption, he pictures to us — 
 
 The children build their bowers, 
 
 Sticking kerchief-pots of mold 
 All about their full-blown flowers, 
 Thick as sheep in shepherd's fold ! 
 
 Describing c A whirl-blast from behind the hill/ 
 he observes — 
 
 the spacious floor 
 
 With withered leaves is covered o'er. 
 You could not lay a hair between : 
 And all the year the bower is green. 
 
26 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 But see ! where'er the hailstones drop. 
 The withered leaves all skip and hop. 
 * * * * >:< * 
 
 The leaves in myriads jump and spring. 
 
 In his poem The Reverie of poor Susan^ we 
 have another kind of minute detail — 
 
 At the corner of Wood-street, when daylight appears, 
 Hangs a thrush that sings loud, it has sung for three years. 
 
 In the first part of his Hartleap Well he in- 
 dulges in minutiae of measurement — 
 
 And climbing up the hill — (it was at least 
 Four roods of sheer ascent) — 
 
 In the second part he observes — 
 
 As I from Hawes to Richmond did repair, 
 It chanced that I saw, standing in a dell, 
 Three aspens, at three corners of a square ; 
 And one, not four yards distant, near a well : 
 
 and again, further on — 
 
 And he, perhaps, for aught we know, was born 
 Not half a furlong from that self-same spring. 
 
 Alfred Tennyson, in his Godiva, had possibly 
 the foregoing poem in mind when he wrote — 
 
 His beard a foot before him, and his hair 
 A yard behind. 
 
 The danger of studying Nature through the 
 medium of books, or of poetry alone, is that 
 which is well known to be the common failing 
 of mere copyists, who seize on trifling peculiari- 
 ties, often those which the poet himself would 
 have repudiated, and then imagine that their ex- 
 travagances are the purest possible emanations 
 from a healthy enthusiasm. 
 
 We approach the interesting, if not sufficiently 
 instructive, observations of Professor Arnold, in 
 
INTRODUCTION. 27 
 
 his Essays on Criticism, 1865, with a full con- 
 viction that what he states with so much ability 
 is offered without any reservation. Speaking of 
 Maurice de Guerin, a young French poet, he 
 observes : — 
 
 The grand power of poetry is its interpreta- 
 tive power ; not a power of drawing out in 
 black and white an explanation of the mystery 
 of the universe, but the power of so dealing 
 with things as to awaken in us a wonderfully 
 full, new, and intimate sense of them, and of 
 our relations with them. When this sense is 
 awakened in us, as to objects without us, we 
 feel ourselves to be in contact with the essential 
 nature of those objects, to be no longer be- 
 wildered and oppressed by them, but to have 
 their secret, and to be in harmony with them ; 
 and this feeling calms and satisfies us as no other 
 can. 
 
 Poetry, indeed, interprets in another way 
 beside this ; but one of its two ways of inter- 
 preting, of exercising its highest power, is by 
 awakening this sense in us. 
 
 Without making it a matter of inquiry 
 c whether this sense is illusive, whether it can be 
 proved not to be illusive, whether it does abso- 
 lutely make us possess the real nature of things ;' 
 he says that c poetry can awaken it in us, 
 and that to awaken it is one of the highest 
 powers of poetry.' He adds : — 
 
 The interpretations of science do not give us 
 this intimate sense of objects as the interpreta- 
 tions of poetry give it ; they appeal to a limited 
 faculty and not to the whole man. It is not 
 
28 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Linnaeus, or Cavendish, or Guvier, who gives us 
 the true sense of animals, or water, or plants, 
 who seizes their secret for us, who makes us par- 
 ticipate in their life : it is Shakspeare with his — 
 
 daffodils 
 
 That come before the swallow dares, and take 
 The winds of March with beauty ; 
 
 it is Wordsworth, with his — 
 
 voice heard 
 
 In spring-time from the cuckoo-bird, 
 Breaking the silence of the seas 
 Among the farthest Hebrides ; 
 
 it is Keats, with his — 
 
 moving waters at their priestlike task, 
 
 Of cold ablution round Earth's human shores ; 
 
 it is Chateaubriand, with his c cime indeterminee 
 des for its ;' it is Senancour, with his mountain 
 birch-tree : ' Cette Score e blanche, lisse et crevassee ; 
 cette tige agreste ; ces branches qui s^inclinent 
 vers la terre ; la mobllite des feuilles, et tout 
 cet abandon, s implicit e de la nature, attitude des 
 deserts? 
 
 What we are disappointed with in this argu- 
 ment is in reference to the c power of so dealing 
 with things [the universe and its objects] as to 
 awaken a full, new, and intimate sense of them.' 
 However imperfectly told, it might have led to 
 some useful end; but of this important 'power' we 
 learn nothing beyond being assured that it exists ; 
 and that it is a c sense ' which may be ' awakened 
 in us, but whether it must come with our infant 
 breath, or may be acquired by a course of study, 
 is all matter of guess-work. This is the more un- 
 fortunate and distressing to the aspiring genius, 
 
INTRODUCTION. 2g 
 
 who is assured that with such a possession he 
 would c be no longer bewildered and oppressed by 
 [objects without us] but have their secret, and 
 be in harmony with them, a, feeling which calms 
 and satisfies as no other can.' And as if only to 
 perplex the more rather than relieve us, here we 
 have again to deal with a ' secret,' and one no less 
 than that of the universe and its objects. If a 
 secret, there is an end of the matter; if not a 
 secret, as we presume it is not to those who pro- 
 fess to know of so much about it, will no man 
 boldly blurt it out to the world ; or is it the poet's 
 Alcahest, reserved for communication to those 
 only who have been duly initiated and sanctified? 
 
 Science is so completely the antipodes of 
 poetry, that two such opposite poles are never 
 likely to embrace and salute each other ; but 
 laying aside the poetical side of the question, we 
 confess our belief that if anything can be ration- 
 ally stated on the subject it would be as well to 
 state it at once, no matter how prosaically, so 
 that it was critically correct. But all cloud- 
 writing, all mystery, all notion of secrets relative 
 to man's performances, to human arts, to the ex- 
 ercise of our intellectual faculties, we wish to see 
 for ever banished from prose compositions, leaving 
 to poetry alone a course as free as air and as 
 boundless as creation. 
 
 With praiseworthy candour, Professor Shairp, 
 the author of Studies in Poetry, says — - 
 
 About Nature it has become so much the 
 fashion to rave, there has been so much counter- 
 feit enthusiasm, that one almost dreads speaking 
 of it. But whatever it may be to most men, 
 
JO NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 there can be no doubt that free nature, moun- 
 tain solitudes, were as essential to Wordsworth's 
 heart as the air to his lungs. 
 
 He concludes : — 
 
 The ideal light which Wordsworth sheds 
 brings out only more vividly the real heart of 
 Nature, the inmost feeling, which is really 
 there, and is recognised by Wordsworth's eye 
 in virtue of the kinship between Nature and his 
 soul. 
 
 As we cannot believe there is here any c coun- 
 terfeit enthusiasm,' much less any tendency ' to 
 rave,' we soberly ask to be informed what is 
 meant by c the real heart of nature,' its c in- 
 most feeling ' ? — Is it positively meant that these 
 really exist in every mountain and lake, and 
 all that compounds this vast universe ? A 
 heart to be recognised by any eye physical or 
 mental, a heart which can have c kinship ' with 
 any poet and ' his soul ' ? 
 
 Professor Shairp further observes that — 
 
 To most men the material world is a heavy, 
 gross, dead mass, earth, a ball of black mud, 
 painted here and there with some colour ; 
 Wordsworth felt it to be a living, breathing 
 power, not dead, but full of strange life ; his eye 
 almost saw into it, as if it were transparent. 
 
 The opinion of a writer who appears to be 
 thoroughly on his guard against any other than 
 a quiet, sober view of the subject, sadly perplexes 
 us when he treats of the c material world ' as 
 being to the poet c a living, breathing power, 
 not dead, but full of strange life,' and that c his 
 eye almost saw into it, as if it were transparent.' 
 
INTRODUCTION. 3 1 
 
 This may be poetry, or romance, but it certainly 
 is not criticism. It is said of a certain fish that 
 it disperses a dark, inky fluid when pursued, 
 thereby being lost in darkness of its own creating ; 
 and it is thus, too often, that, when we are pro- 
 mised explanations we are confused amidst a 
 burst of exulting exclamations which only be- 
 cloud and conceal from view the object of which 
 we were in pursuit, and of which we were pro- 
 mised a plain-spoken exposition. 
 
 So many writers, so many different opinions 
 on the subject of Nature-study. Mr. Charles 
 Kingsley in his Miscellanies, 1859, emphatically 
 declares it to be his belief, that — 
 
 It is the mystic who will describe Nature 
 most simply, because he sees most in her, because 
 he is most ready to believe that she will reveal 
 to others the same message which she has re- 
 vealed to him. Men like Behmen, Novalis, and 
 Fourier, who can soar into the inner cloud-world 
 of man's spirit (he asserts) will most humbly and 
 patiently c consider the lilies of the field, how 
 they grow.' He claims for Tennyson this mys- 
 tical character, to account for his having become 
 c the greatest naturalistic poet which England has 
 seen for several centuries.' 
 
 Is the student then to study Dr. Henry More, 
 Jacob Behmen, Emanuel Swedenborg, and other 
 similar mystical writers ? To such shifts are 
 critics driven in the absence of a recognised 
 standard ; like bewildered travellers, each in 
 some path or other, but always circling, or run- 
 ning off at a tangent. 
 
 It is a favourite metaphor to compare Nature 
 
3 2 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 to a Book. In Du Bart as bis Divine We ekes 
 and Works, 4-to, 1605, translated by Joshua 
 Sylvester, this figure is literally depicted as fol- 
 lows : — 
 
 The World's a book in folio, printed all 
 With God's great works in letters capital : 
 Each creature, is a page ; and each effect, 
 A fair character, void of all defect. 
 
 But, as young truants, toying in the schools, 
 Instead of learning, learn to play the fools: 
 We gaze but on the babies and the cover, 
 The gaudy flowers, and edges gilded over ; 
 And never farther for our lesson look 
 Within the volume of this various book : 
 Where learned Nature rudest ones instructs, 
 That, by His wisdom, God the World conducts. 
 
 To read and understand this ponderous 
 ' folio,' we are not obliged to understand ' each 
 stranger's gibberish,' nor Hebrew, Greek, or any 
 other language, but simply require c the specta- 
 cles of faith,' then with the poet we may ' be- 
 hold,' — at least so he professes, — 
 
 Th' Orb from his birth, in 's ages manifold. 
 
 Wordsworth, in the first Book of his Excur- 
 sion, alludes to c a soul communing with the 
 glorious universe.' He represents the Wanderer 
 while but eighteen years of age, as being c pos- 
 sessed,' — and his sensibility to Nature's teachings 
 such, that — 
 
 Thus informed, 
 He had small need of books. 
 
 In Antony and Cleopatra, Shakspeare pre- 
 sents the Soothsayer as remarking: — 
 
 In Nature's infinite book of secrecy, 
 A little I can read. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 33 
 
 Bryant, in the poem entitled Thanatopsis^ ob- 
 serves : — 
 
 To him who in the love of Nature holds 
 Communion with her visible forms, she speaks 
 A various language ; 
 
 * * # * 
 
 Go forth, under the open sky, and list 
 To Nature's teachings, while from all around, — 
 Earth and her waters, and the depths of air, — 
 Comes a still voice 
 
 Emerson, throughout an entire Essay on Na- 
 ture^ comprising eight chapters and their Intro- 
 duction, amidst abundance of extraneous facts 
 never once hints at a process of study. He 
 says justly enough : — 
 
 To speak truly, few adult persons can see 
 Nature. Most persons do not see the sun. At 
 least they have a very superficial seeing. 
 
 He remarks : — Every rational creature has all 
 Nature for his dowry and estate. It is his if he 
 will. 
 
 But unfortunately no man can possess Nature 
 at will, any more than he can possess landed 
 estates without title-deeds, or high art without 
 instruction, study, and practice. 
 
 He professes that: — 'Nature is the symbol 
 of Spirits/ which he represents as the third 
 degree in ' the use which Nature subserves to 
 man in language.' But while we fully agree 
 with most that he advances, we are disappointed 
 to find that he merely adduces disconnected facts 
 without applying them, so as to become avail- 
 able for study, and the effecting of a productive 
 and progressive movement. We see the mate- 
 rials of a building, but no edifice ; all lies scat- 
 
 D 
 
34 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 tered, confused, disconnected, and wanting in 
 design offering a presentable object of utility. A 
 miscellany is not a compact available treatise, 
 and no amount of disjointed facts are available 
 for the promotion of study, just as a painting is 
 no desirable picture if deficient in perspective, as 
 produced by artists of China or Japan, although 
 posse c sing much to admire and approve for cos- 
 tume and vivid colours; one obvious leading 
 feature being absent, the whole dissatisfies and 
 becomes distasteful. Emerson sees Nature suf- 
 ficiently to apply it in some measure, but with- 
 out method or system to guide in that various 
 and absorbing study. 
 
 In respect to ability for the just observance of 
 Nature, Mr. Ruskin* appositely remarks: — 'Can- 
 not we [say the public] see what Nature is with 
 our own eyes, and find out for ourselves what 
 is like her ?' The degree of ignorance of ex- 
 ternal nature in which men may remain, depends 
 partly on the number and character of the sub- 
 jects with which their minds may be otherwise 
 occupied, and partly on a natural want of sensi- 
 bility to the power of beauty of form, and the 
 other attributes of external objects. 
 
 In 1850, David M. Moir [Delta, of Black- 
 wood's Magazine) gave Lectures on Poetical 
 Literature [1800-50], in which he avowed his 
 belief that scientific progress was rapidly curtail- 
 ing the province of poetry ; that in short the 
 age was becoming far too matter-of-fact ; but 
 yet that while men breathe, there is room for a 
 new Sappho or a new Simonides to melt, and 
 
 * Modern Painters, vol. i., 8vo. 1846. 
 
INTRODUCTION. $$ 
 
 for a new Tyrtseus and a new Pindar to excite 
 and inspire. Therefore, he adds, he does not 
 despair of poetry ultimately recovering from the 
 staggering blows which science has inflicted in 
 the shape of steam conveyance — of electro-mag- 
 netism — of geological exposition — of political 
 economy — of statistics — in fact, by a series of 
 dis enchantments* 
 
 Not without hope, he declares his belief that, 
 Original genius in due time must from new 
 elements frame new combinations ; and these 
 may be at least what the kaleidoscope is to the 
 rainbow, or an explosion of hydrogen in the 
 gasometer to a flash of lightning on the hills. 
 But this (he considers) does not alter his position 
 — that all facts are prose y until coloured by 
 imagination or passion. 
 
 In support of his position, he says, From 
 physic we have swept away alchemy, incanta- 
 tion, and cure by the royal touch ; from divinity, 
 exorcism, and purgatory, and excommunication ; 
 and from law, the trial by wager of battle, the 
 ordeal by touch, the mysterious confessions of 
 witchcraft. In the foamy seas, we can never 
 more expect to see Proteus leading out his flocks ; 
 nor, in the dimpling stream, another Narcissus 
 admiring his own fair face ; nor Diana again 
 descending on Latmos to Endymion. We cannot 
 hope another Una, ' making a sunshine in the 
 shady place ; 5 nor another Macbeth, meeting 
 with other witches on the blasted heath ; 
 nor another Faust, wandering amid the mys- 
 terious sights and sounds of another Mayday 
 night. Robin Hoods and Rob Roys are incom- 
 
 D 2 
 
36 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 patible with sheriffs and the county police. 
 Rocks are stratified by geologists, exactly as satins 
 are measured by mercers ; and Echo, no longer 
 a vagrant classic nymph, is compelled quietly to 
 succumb to the laws of acoustics. 
 
 Thus despondingly, and yet somewhat hu- 
 morously, did the lecturer address his audience. 
 Like Bruyere, he was evidently prepared to ex- 
 claim ' All is said ;' or with Dr. Johnson to 
 decide that all the materials of poetry and 
 romance are used up, and their charms dissi- 
 pated. 
 
 The study of Nature being an Art and not 
 a Science, Humboldt has very happily met the 
 fears of those timid searchers among Nature's 
 abundant stores whom Moir's remarks indicate, 
 by observing in the Introduction to his Cosmos : 
 
 It is almost with reluctance that he is about 
 to speak of a sentiment which appears to arise 
 from narrow-minded [? incorrect] views, or from 
 a certain weak and morbid sentimentality. — He 
 alludes to the fear entertained by some persons, 
 that Nature may by degrees lose a portion of the 
 charm and magic of her power, as we learn 
 more and more how to unveil her secrets, com- 
 prehend the mechanism of the movements of the 
 heavenly bodies, and estimate numerically the 
 intensity of natural forces. 
 
 In reviewing the opinions mostly expressed by 
 approved writers on the subject, we find that 
 they principally restrict themselves to urging 
 faithfulness in description of the objects pre- 
 sented to our senses in external Nature. Some 
 go so far as to recommend as a necessary pre- 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 37 
 
 paration for correct delineation of natural scenery, 
 and the habits and appearances of animal and 
 vegetable creation generally, that the poet should 
 study, as it were, to become an astronomer, zoo- 
 logist, botanist, chemist, and in short occupy 
 himself with science generally. In support of 
 this view the exactness of some poets and the 
 errors of others in reference to animals, plants, 
 moonlight, &c, are offered as sufficient evidence. 
 The first writer who feelingly addressed himself 
 to the consideration of this subject, was unques- 
 tionably Nature's own first best poet, Words- 
 worth. He particularly notices, as we have seen, 
 that Dryden's voluminous works do not afford 
 one new image derived from Nature, in the 
 wide sense of that term ; and the same deficiency, 
 he observes, marks the poetry of the long period 
 from the time of Milton to Thomson ; com- 
 prehending among others the names of Marvel, 
 Butler, Walton, Otway, Waller, Moore, Lee, 
 Vaughan, Philips, Parnell, Rowe, and Garth. 
 But Wordsworth, like all other poets, has left us 
 only his own productions by which to judge of 
 his own special, and perhaps to himself pecu- 
 liar method of Nature-Study. What he states 
 in his Preface has reference only to descriptive 
 poetry ; all else is left for sensibility to discover 
 without a single hint conducting to any approved 
 method of his own, in the application of natural 
 or educated sensibility, to assist the c range of a 
 poet's perceptions.' Yet much he could have 
 told us how he himself was c incited to observe 
 objects, both as they exist in themselves, and as 
 reacted upon by his own mind.' But as he 
 
38 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 was not called on, so neither has he thought 
 proper to divulge his secret. His method of 
 study, whatever it was, lies embalmed in his 
 poems, open to many and contradictory opinions, 
 calculated rather to confuse than to instruct. 
 The commentators of the next century will form 
 a much calmer and clearer estimate of the poet 
 in this particular than can be expected from 
 writers so near to his own time as his critics of 
 the present day : some too enthusiastic and 
 laudatory ; others too petulant, feeble, and self- 
 opinionated. Professor Arnold, looking on Nature 
 as a world-wide book, treats of an interpretative 
 power in the poet, a power which has nearly 
 a corresponding effect on the reader. Professor 
 Shairp, however, finds that the poet must possess 
 a peculiarly piercing visual, mental, and physical 
 organ, before which all the matter of the 
 universe becomes as it were transparent like 
 crystal, exposing to the enraptured poet the 
 ' real heart of nature.' On the other hand, Mr. 
 Kingsley adopts Behmen and other mystical 
 writers as models for the poet's study of Nature ; 
 and he finds in Tennyson a lively example of 
 this identical mystical character. Nature is re- 
 presented to declare herself only to such Vision- 
 aries ; so that learning, science, and common 
 sense, without a marked ingraining of mysticism, 
 render the efficient study of Nature next to an 
 impossibility ! 
 
 Emerson in a long Essay on Nature does little 
 more than repeat all we have over and over 
 again read and heard in praise of the greatness 
 and grandeur of Nature, with its many beauties 
 
INTRODUCTION. ^ 
 
 and excellencies; and provokingly assures 'every 
 rational creature ' — that he has this vast uni- 
 verse ' for his dowry and estate.' But he evades 
 the main object of our search, that is, how to 
 obtain its precious gems and metals, and effec- 
 tively cultivate such a magnificent magnitude of 
 territory. 
 
 Mr. Moir found that physics are deranging 
 and occupying the once fertile province of poetry ; 
 and that, what with machinery and manu- 
 factures, mankind for the future can expect but 
 little originality in poetical compositions ; from 
 which judgment we are left to infer that a return 
 to the dark ages, or at the very least to the less 
 brilliant period of our forefathers, offers the only 
 feasible means of establishing a poetical reputa- 
 tion of any considerable character. 
 
 This sketch, although it far from exhausts the 
 adverse criticism on this subject, may yet suffice 
 to show the wide want of agreement in the 
 opinions of writers on this matter, notwithstanding 
 its importance, and its at first appearing to be 
 one capable of being very simply elucidated. 
 
 The Literature of this subject is highly sug- 
 gestive, so many distinct and diametrically op- 
 posed statements are made. Some are all mys- 
 tery, others prosaic laudations of Nature, while a 
 few affect to be very philosophical. One author 
 seizes on the idea of a universal soul, or spirit, or 
 light ; some expound its doctrines and others its 
 principles; some give us views, others harmo- 
 nies, others beauties and sublimities of Nature. 
 Large as is the field, labourers have not being 
 wanting to realise its stores of wealth after some 
 
40 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 manner or other, but never with any successful 
 result when instruction is sought. 
 
 Every scholar is aware how thoroughly Na- 
 ture permeates language, whether colloquial or 
 written, whether in prose or in poetry, however 
 humble or impassioned may be its expression. 
 The sacred Scriptures abound in illustrations of 
 this simple statement ; and we trace it further as 
 marking the character of most popular pro- 
 verbs. Man is of Nature, natural, and seldom 
 loses sight of his origin and connection with the 
 great world of material mould. He is of the 
 earth, earthy. How shall this living matter 
 investigate inert matter, dumb life, vegetable 
 existence, together with the animating air, water, 
 heat, light, and electricity ? As mind can sit in 
 judgment on mind, so may mind with far 
 brighter hopes of success examine into this Uni- 
 verse of Matter, and therefrom educe a practical 
 method of Nature-Study. 
 
CRITICISM, UNSATISFACTORY. 4 1 
 
 Chapter II. 
 
 Criticism affords no definite rules in reference to the study 
 of Nature ; Nature, as distinguished from Art, includes 
 the entire Creation, animate and inanimate ; various 
 critical opinions examined, especially in reference to 
 Wordsworth's philosophy of Nature ; unmeaning lan- 
 guage reprobated ; poets best record their own Nature- 
 Study ; the practice of Thomson, Young, Pope, Scott, 
 Coleridge, and Dr. Southey, with illustrations from the 
 latter, and from Wordsworth's Excursion. 
 
 Every scince and every art, the art of Nature- 
 Study excepted, takes a definite, a methodical 
 form, hence their professors treat the subjects 
 relating to them as portions of a great system. 
 Astronomy does not consist merely in a know- 
 ledge of a few hundred stars, or botany in an 
 acquaintance with a certain number of plants. 
 But Nature-Study is at present so limited in its 
 range, that its stores of facts are isolated and 
 appear to have no connection with each other. 
 Coleridge in his Biographia Liter aria very judi- 
 ciously remarks : — 
 
 It is the prime merit of genius, and its most 
 unequivocal mode of manifestation, so to repre- 
 sent familiar objects, as to awaken in the minds 
 of others a kindred feeling concerning them, and 
 that freshness of sensation which is the constant 
 accompaniment of mental, no less than of bodily, 
 convalescence. Who has not a thousand times 
 seen snow fall on water ? Who has not watched 
 
42 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 it with a new feeling from the time that he has 
 read Burns' comparison of sensual pleasure : — 
 
 To snow that falls upon a river, 
 
 A moment white — then gone for ever ! 
 
 But he draws no inferences from the instance 
 thus cited of Burns's eye and feeling for proper 
 and forcible applications of occurrences in Nature 
 which every season modifies, and which every 
 day meet our common observation. In like 
 manner that acute observer, Mr. Ruskin, al- 
 though writing more for the painter than the 
 poet, points out, in an incidental allusion to the 
 subject, that, among typical applications of Na- 
 ture, we find : — 
 
 Grass — for humility, cheerfulness, and the 
 passing away of human life ; 
 
 Flowers — as objects especially loved by poets ; 
 
 Infinity — for redeemed life ; and as expressed 
 by curvature and gradation ; and 
 
 Mystery — as never absent in Nature. 
 And he adds as an observation of his own, that 
 shadow does not exist on clear water ; thus sub- 
 stituting appearance for fact ; because although 
 such may seem to be the effect, not a leaf could 
 float on water so circumstanced without at once 
 coming under the influence of the unseen, black, 
 but transparent shade. 
 
 Professor Bain, treating of The Senses and the 
 Intellect, 1864, adduces examples of comparisons 
 employed in literary art for ornament and effect, 
 and of figures of speech implying comparison. 
 He says : — 
 
 Human actions, feelings, and thoughts, are 
 often so concealed in their workings, that they 
 
FIGURES OF SPEECH. 43 
 
 cannot be represented without the assistance of 
 material objects used as comparisons ; hence the 
 great abundance of the resemblances struck be- 
 tween matter and mind. We speak of a clear 
 head, a warm heart, a torrent of passion, a poet's 
 fire. The comparisons brought to bear upon the 
 complexities of social life are likewise very nume- 
 rous ; in fact there are many social phenomena 
 that we never conceive otherwise than in some 
 matrix of material analogy. If we take, for 
 example, the different ideas connected with social 
 order and disorder, we find the language almost 
 wholly derived from other things : scarcely a 
 phrase is literal, all is metaphorical. i The vessel 
 of the State weathers the storm,' or is ' in danger 
 of wreck ;' anarchy is described as c chaos,' ' con- 
 fusion' ; the Government is said to be ' shaken,' 
 or ' stable,' or c tottering ;' law is c erected,' c over- 
 thrown.' We speak of the c life ' and ' growth ' 
 of society ; when we conceive of progress, it is 
 generally in a figure ; we call it c movement,' 
 ' development,' c enlightenment,' and so forth. 
 
 Professor Bain further illustrates his remarks 
 by observing : — 
 
 In virtue of this surprising power, Bacon's 
 doctrines became clothed in 4 winged words.' 
 According to him, science is the c interpretation ' 
 of Nature ;* a comparison that transfixes the mind 
 with the idea of observing, recording, and ex- 
 plaining the facts of the world. Final causes, he 
 says, are c vestal virgins ;' they bear no fruit. 
 But for this simile, it is doubtful if this notion 
 would have stuck in men's minds and been the 
 
 * See Arnold's Remarks, chapter i. page 27, 
 
44 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 subject of keen controversy. Professor Bain adds : 
 ' Although Bacon's imagery sometimes rises to 
 poetry, this is not its usual character ; his was 
 not "a poetic sense of Nature, but a broad general 
 susceptibility, partaking more of the natural his- 
 torian than of the poet ; by which all the objects 
 coming before his view, or presented to his ima- 
 gination, took a deep hold, and by the help of 
 his intense attraction of similarity were recalled 
 on the slightest similitude. Many great writers 
 in English literature have had this strong suscep- 
 tibility to the sensible world at large, without a 
 special poetic sense; while some have had the 
 poetic feeling superadded ; these last are our 
 greatest poets, Chaucer, Milton, Shakspeare.' 
 
 No one can dissent from the statements made 
 by Coleridge, Mr. Ruskin, or Professor Bain, 
 indeed they fairly illustrate a commonly accepted 
 mode in which the subject as applying to the 
 influences of Nature on our minds and language 
 is usually recorded, without its appearing to the 
 writers as other than the expression of sufficient 
 and satisfactory statements on the subject. After 
 centuries of acquaintance with this vast universe, 
 with its manifold productions and many living 
 creatures, we are talking about it, as reflected in 
 our own minds, and more especially as mirrored 
 in the mind of the poet, as philosophers would 
 have discoursed of old about the stars, or man 
 and animals, and cosmography at large. A pro- 
 cess so elementary that it would not be endured 
 or even attempted in discussing any other art, is 
 characteristic of all criticisms touching the study 
 of Nature, and the results of that study. Like 
 
NATURE, CREATION. 45 
 
 circumnavigators of the globe, the critic's pinnace 
 inevitably returns to the port from whence it 
 started, less fruitful in results than an arctic ex- 
 pedition. 
 
 Nature comprehends all forms of terrestrial 
 and celestial matter cognizant by our senses, 
 whether the same be ponderable or imponder- 
 able, animate or inanimate ; all created things, 
 as well in their entirety as in their parts, and all 
 conceivable circumstances that can possibly affect 
 them. Our globe, with all its surroundings of 
 atmosphere, clouds, sun, planets, and stars, offers 
 to the human mind such apparently unattainable 
 heights, unfathomable depths, and limitless 
 bounds, that it has been for ages left almost 
 wholly to the poet, and even he can only afford 
 us occasional glimpses of Nature's profound beau- 
 ties, sublimities, and mysteries. But while 
 Homer and Sophocles, Shakspeare and Milton, 
 Goethe and Wordsworth, have charmed mankind 
 with strains of poetry inspired by universal 
 Nature itself, another class of genius, aiming at 
 no flights of fancy, but sternly dealing with facts, 
 has philosophically measured and calculated the 
 starry system, this glorious earth, its vast waters, 
 all inanimate objects, all living creatures, includ- 
 ing man himself, with an exactness of inquiry 
 repugnant to the poetical temperament. 
 
 Nature as viewed and meditated on by the 
 poet, and Nature as examined and experimented 
 upon by the philosopher, presents us, as it were, 
 with two worlds, or the same world in one sense 
 etherealized, but in the other both realized and 
 anatomized : the one productive of results appli- 
 
46 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 cable to literature and oratory ; the other to the 
 embellishment, comfort, and happiness of social 
 life. 
 
 It is remarkable that the idea should ever have 
 been entertained that the progress of science 
 could be detrimental to the growth of the taste 
 for poetical compositions, as though ignorance 
 were conducive to the appreciation of poetry. 
 Let the poet enlarge his Nature-Study in a de- 
 gree proportioned to that which has extended the 
 investigations of the philosopher, and poetry 
 will unquestionably exhibit subtantial progress, 
 though widely different from that of science in 
 its course and results. 
 
 Poets have never been wanting in their praise 
 of external Nature; but as it would require 
 volumes to quote all, we present a few ap- 
 propriate examples. Beattie in his Minstrel, 
 sings : — 
 
 O Nature, how in every charm supreme ! 
 Whose votaries feast on raptures ever new ! 
 O for the voice and fire of seraphim, 
 To sing thy glories with devotion due ! 
 Blest be the day I 'scaped the wrangling crew, 
 From Pyrrho's maze, and Epicurus' sty ; 
 And held high converse with the godlike few, 
 Who to th' enraptured heart, and ear, and eye, 
 Teach beauty, virtue, truth, and love, and melody. 
 
 Thomson, in The Seasons, feelingly expresses 
 his deep sense of the difficulties that surrounded 
 his great undertaking : — 
 
 But who can paint, 
 
 Like Nature ? Can imagination boast, 
 Amid its gay creation, hues like hers ? 
 
 If fancy then 
 
 Unequal fails beneath the pleasing task, 
 
EXTERNAL NATURE. 
 
 47 
 
 Ah, what shall language do ? ah, where find words 
 Tinged with so many colours ; and whose power, 
 To life approaching, may perfume my lays 
 With that fine oil, those aromatic gales, 
 That inexhaustive flow continual round ? 
 
 The rustic muse of Burns finds expression in 
 the lines : — 
 
 O Nature ! a' thy shows and forms 
 
 To feeling, pensive hearts ha'e charms ! 
 
 Whether the summer kindly warms, 
 
 Wi' life and light, 
 Or winter howls, in gusty storms, 
 
 The lang, dark night. 
 
 The muse, nae poet ever fand her, 
 Till by himsel' he learn'd to wander, 
 Adown some trotting" burn's meander, 
 
 And no think lang ; 
 Or sweet to stray, an' pensive ponder 
 
 A heart-felt song. 
 
 Wordsworth solemnly and plaintively declares 
 that he has " felt "— 
 
 A presence that disturbs me with the joy 
 Of elevated thoughts ; a sense sublime 
 Of something far more deeply interfused, 
 Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, 
 And the round ocean and the living air, 
 And the blue sky, and in the mind of man, 
 A motion and a spirit, that impels 
 All thinking things, all objects of all thought, 
 And rolls through all things. 
 
 And Lord Byron in Childe Harold exclaims: — 
 
 Dear Nature is the kindest mother still, 
 Though always changing, in her aspect mild ; 
 
 Oh ! she is fairest in her features wild, 
 Where nothing polish'd dares pollute her path. 
 
 But while such are the poetical expressions of 
 gifted bards in reference to Nature's power and 
 happy influences, it always happens that ordinary, 
 
 * Wordsworth in The Excursion has " trotting brooks." 
 
48 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 uncultivated minds are feebly affected by 
 contact with natural objects, scenery, and phe- 
 nomena. The impressions received by them 
 are exceedingly evanescent, showing that a cer- 
 tain degree of cultivation and refinement is re- 
 quisite to direct and improve the taste of the 
 generality of mankind, and to enable them to 
 appreciate the beauties of Nature. Man, from 
 his position in the system of creation, might be 
 expected to possess intuitively such a strong im- 
 pulse towards the study of Nature, as to impel 
 him naturally to seek information on all matters 
 presented to his senses. Yet we find that such is 
 not the case. Neither rocks nor deserts, not 
 islands or ocean, not barren fields or cultivated 
 plantations, will of themselves convey instruction 
 to ordinary minds. They are but as the ruins of 
 Rome, the hieroglyphically inscribed monuments 
 of Egypt, or the primeval forests of America. 
 When once mind resolves to act on dead matter, 
 then indeed will the external world react on in- 
 telligent man in a manner to convey an impres- 
 sion of absolute vitality. 
 
 The present advanced state of knowledge has 
 not sufficed to dispel the cloud of misconceptions 
 that has been long accumulating on the subject 
 of external Nature ; and many who think they 
 see plainly, and clearly comprehend all that 
 Nature spreads before them in common with the 
 artist and the poet, are yet unblessed with insight 
 into the abounding beauties of the natural world. 
 To appreciate Nature, they must resort to their 
 accustomed mirrors, and see first in pictures or in 
 poems those beauties to which they were pre- 
 
METAPHOR. 49 
 
 viously blind. Even then acuteness of perception 
 will be wanting, and they will miss the appro- 
 priate mental enjoyment. To be placed in the very 
 midst of natural beauty, yet not seeing it, is like 
 not hearing music, although attentively listening 
 to every sound. What the mind does not fully 
 comprehend is lost to the sense that should be 
 affected, whether it be the sight, or the hearing, 
 or the taste.* 
 
 Study implies use, and the study of Nature 
 leads to an infusion into the language of the 
 poet and the orator of innumerable graces and 
 ornaments derivable from that unfailing source. 
 Of these graces not the least is Metaphor. Dr. 
 Whately, in his Elements of Rhetoric, 1846, 
 treating of novelty in metaphor, remarks : — 
 
 There is very little, comparatively, of energy 
 produced by a metaphor or simile that is in 
 common use, and already familiar to the hearer. 
 Indeed what were originally the boldest meta- 
 phors, are become, by long use, virtually, proper 
 terms ; — as in the use of the words source, 
 reflection, &c, in their transferred senses ; and 
 frequently are even nearly obsolete in the literal 
 sense, as in the words ardour, acuteness, ruminate, 
 edification, &c. If, again, a metaphor or simile 
 that is not so hackneyed as to be considered 
 common property, be taken from any known 
 author, it strikes every one as no less a plagiarism 
 than if an entire argument or description had 
 
 * The author is acquainted with a singular instance of 
 of a hale, hearty, middle-aged man who has never had the 
 sense of smell, so that all odours whether pleasant or 
 offensive seem alike to him. 
 
 E 
 
5° 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 been thus transferred. And hence it is that, as 
 Aristotle, remarks, the skilful employment of 
 these, more than of any other, ornaments of 
 language, may be regarded as a c mark of genius.' 
 Not that he means to say, as some interpreters 
 suppose, that this power is entirely a gift of 
 Nature, and in no degree to be learnt ; on the 
 contrary, he expressly affirms that the 'perception 
 of resemblances,' on which it depends, is the 
 fruit of c Philosophy ' ; but he means that any 
 metaphor which is striking from being not in 
 common use, is a kind of property of him who 
 has invented it, and cannot fairly be transferred 
 from his composition to another's. 
 
 These critical observations point to bold meta- 
 phors long in use, that have become effete ; they 
 remind us that in a striking metaphor we recog- 
 nise its author and accord to him the honour of 
 its invention ; and that the employment of these 
 and similar ornaments of language are no small 
 c mark of genius.' Even Aristotle admits the 
 possibility of there being something to be learnt 
 in this matter to assist the less gifted or inspired 
 among orators and poets. Who will guide us in our 
 search for this invaluable treasure of knowledge ? 
 It is agonizing to hear so much of treasures sunk, 
 as it might appear, in an oceanic abyss. The 
 poet Moore feigns to have met on the coast of 
 the Red Sea a venerable man, yclept Philosophy, 
 of whom he says : — 
 
 He told 
 
 Of the dark veil, which many an age hath hung 
 
 O'er Nature's form, till by the touch of time 
 
 The mystic shroud grew thin and luminous, 
 
 And half the goddess beam'd in glimpses through it! 
 
ANCIENT POETRY. 5 I 
 
 Such was his Vision of Philosophy, which it 
 would be well for mankind should it ever be 
 realized. At present, and for all past time, this 
 ' goddess ' of the poet's has remained veiled in 
 all but Cimmerian darkness. 
 
 Poetry, although taking precedence of Philoso- 
 phy, has not preserved to us any record of man's 
 earlier conceptions of Nature at large ; but from 
 a remote antiquity, man has ever loved to dwell 
 on the history, life, and mind of human nature 
 without distinction as to country, sex, age, or 
 position in society. Whatever we can gather 
 relative to early feelings in respect to external 
 nature is of the very highest interest. 
 
 Humboldt, an accomplished scholar and in- 
 defatigable, observant traveller, remarks : — 
 
 A profound feeling of Nature pervades the 
 most ancient poetry of the Hebrews and Indians ; 
 and exists among nations of very different de- 
 scent. 
 
 He also observes incidentally that : No descrip- 
 tion has been transmitted to us from antiquity 
 of the eternal snow of the Alps, reddened by 
 the evening glow or the morning dawn ; of the 
 beauty of the blue ice of the glaciers ; or of the 
 sublimity of Swiss natural scenery, for although 
 men of talent were continually passing through 
 Helvetia on their road to Gaul, yet they never 
 appear to have paid any attention to the romantic 
 scenery through which they travelled. 
 
 Schiller has observed that the Greek poet is 
 certainly, in the highest degree, correct, faithful, 
 and circumstantial in his descriptions of Nature, 
 but his heart has no more share in his words 
 
 E 2 
 
$2 N ATURE-STUD Y. 
 
 than if he were treating of a garment, a shield, 
 or a suit of armour. Nature seems to interest 
 his understanding more than his moral percep- 
 tions ; he does not cling to her charms with the 
 fervour and the plaintive passion of the poet of 
 modern times. 
 
 Whether we read the Views of Nature or the 
 Cosmos of Humboldt, we continually find inter- 
 spersed throughout their pages such observations 
 on Nature as could alone come from an enthu- 
 siastic and yet close and classical as well as 
 scientific observer of ocean, forests, savannahs, 
 mountain solitudes, and boundless steppes and 
 prairies, together with their luxurious natural 
 productions, supplying abundant matters for 
 studious investigation. In the Introductory por- 
 tion of his latter work, he says : — 
 
 The most important result of a rational in- 
 quiry into Nature is to establish the unity and 
 harmony of its stupendous mass of force and 
 matter, to determine with impartial justice what 
 is due to the discoveries of the past and to those 
 of the present, and to analyse the individual 
 parts of natural phenomena without succumbing 
 beneath the weight of the whole. Thus and 
 thus alone, he urges, is it permitted to man, 
 while mindful of the high destiny of his race, 
 to comprehend Nature, and submit the results of 
 observation to the tests of reason and intellect. 
 With a just appreciation of scientific inquiry he 
 adds that the mere accumulation of unconnected 
 observations of details, devoid of generalization 
 of ideas, may doubtlessly have tended to create 
 and foster the deeply-rooted prejudice, that the 
 
STUDY OF NATURE. 53 
 
 study of the exact sciences must necessarily chill 
 the feelings, and diminish the nobler enjoyments, 
 attendant upon a contemplation of Nature. Those 
 who still cherish such erroneous views in the 
 present age, and amid the progress of public 
 opinion, and the advancement of all branches of 
 knowledge, fail (as he conceives) in duly appre- 
 ciating the value of every enlargement of the 
 sphere of intellect, and the importance of the 
 detail of isolated facts in leading us to general 
 results. 
 
 Turn where we will, whether to the rhe- 
 torician, the classical scholar, or the accomplished 
 man of letters and travel, we are left to our own 
 course, either to guess at Nature, or to study it 
 scientifically. The one, a study without grammar, 
 guide, or general discipline, is the one wished-for 
 study for the acquirement of new figures, de- 
 scriptions, and uses of the wide world of Nature 
 in poetry and eloquence. 
 
 Campbell, as a poet and successful votary of 
 Nature, offers some remarks in his Essay and 
 general criticisms which are highly worthy of 
 notice here. In speaking of Pope he is led to 
 observe : — 
 
 Nature is the poet's goddess ; not her mere 
 inanimate face, or the simple landscape painting 
 of trees, clouds, precipices, and flowers is to be 
 understood. — Nature, in the wide and proper 
 sense of the word, means life in all its circum- 
 stances — nature moral as well as external. — Pope, 
 though not absolutely picturesque, is by no means 
 deficient as a painter of interesting external objects. 
 — Nor is he without observations of animal 
 
54 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 nature, in which every epithet is a decisive 
 touch. 
 
 He also notices Wordsworth's having stated in 
 respect to Dryden : — That his cannot be the lan- 
 guage of imagination must have necessarily 
 followed from this — that there is not a single 
 image from Nature in the whole body- of his 
 works. 
 
 It will be observed that in most of the evidence 
 brought forward there is a prevailing criticism 
 on the style of descriptive poetry, as to its 
 barrenness, fruitfulness, richness, accuracy, and 
 striking observances of all the eye can perceive 
 in Nature ; a style of composition very appo- 
 sitely designated word-painting. All beyond is 
 a terra incognita, full of mysteries, and is 
 Cerebus-guarded to all but a small knot of 
 inspired geniuses. 
 
 All writers on philology trace the enlargement, 
 power, and eloquence of language to an infusion 
 into speech of the very terms employed to dis- 
 tinguish very opposite living or even dead matter. 
 This applies also to proverbial sayings, the con- 
 centrated wisdom of our forefathers ; and to 
 fables whether ancient or modern. In poetry 
 philologists trace to our common love of 
 Nature innumerable figures of speech, and 
 highest of all word-pictures, as in descriptive 
 verse. 
 
 Professor Max Miiller has enlightened us a 
 little on Nature itself, in his Lectures on the 
 Science of Language, observing : — 
 
 It is a well-known fact, which recent re- 
 searches have not shaken, that Nature is incap- 
 
ELEMENTARY VIEWS. 55 
 
 able of progress or improvement. The flower 
 which the botanist observes to-day was as perfect 
 from the beginning. Animals, which are en- 
 dowed with what is called an artistic instinct, 
 have never brought that instinct to a higher 
 degree of perfection. The hexagonal cells of 
 the bee are not more regular in the 19th century 
 than at any earlier period, and the gift of song 
 has never, as far as we know, been brought to 
 a higher perfection by our nightingale than by 
 the Philomele of the Greeks. c Natural history,' 
 to quote Dr. Whewell's * words, when sys- 
 tematically treated, excludes all that is historical, 
 for it classes objects by their permanent and 
 universal properties, and has nothing to do with 
 the narration of particular or casual facts. 
 
 How true all this is, and yet how exceedingly 
 elementary. What strides we have made in 
 Nature-Study to be able to speak with certainty 
 respecting at least one feature in Nature ! The 
 prevalent impressions on the minds of most men 
 concerning Nature are of the most vague and 
 unsettled character; showing that they have 
 never given to the subject their serious attention, 
 as if they considered it too magnificent and 
 multiform for compression into an available 
 system. 
 
 To the poet, and to him alone, must we look 
 to be informed of what are the manifold in- 
 fluences of animate and inanimate nature on his 
 mental constitution ; and from his experience as 
 conveyed through his literary practice we may 
 hope to arrange a critical code of rules consti- 
 * See his History of Inductive Sciences. 
 
$6 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 tuting an absolute system based on the soundest 
 principles. 
 
 The poet's world of Nature first demands our 
 notice, to ascertain how far it differs from ordi- 
 narily accepted opinions regarding Nature, a 
 term of large and yet often differing acceptation 
 as usually treated. In his Science of Language, 
 Professor Max Mliller, speaking of Nature, 
 says : — 
 
 c We use the word readily and constantly, but 
 when we try to think of Nature as a being, or 
 as an aggregate of beings, or as a power, or as 
 an aggregate of powers, our mind soon drops : 
 there is nothing to lay hold of, nothing that 
 exists or resists.' So little can modern intelligence 
 avail in explaining the matter that he quotes 
 Buffon and Cuvier to show that even those 
 great naturalists, differing in their views, offered 
 nothing more satisfactory than the fables of 
 Gcea, the mother of Uranos, the wife of Uranos. 
 
 Boyle, in a long Essay on Nature, following 
 in the footsteps of Aristotle, treated of it as : i — 
 to mean God ; 2 — either essence, or quiddity ; 
 3 — original temperament or constitution of bodies; 
 4 — the moving of a body of its own accord ; 
 5 — the established or settled course of things ; 
 6 — essential properties or qualities, as fabric of 
 the world, system of the universe, cosmical 
 mechanism, &c. ; 7 — the world or universe ; and 
 so forth. 
 
 Such real or attempted refinements may have 
 had their influence in misdirecting and in 
 retarding many a poet's progress in becoming 
 better acquainted with Nature than might fall 
 
THE POETS NATURE, 57 
 
 to the lot of his unaided judgment. The poet's 
 Nature is at once the most simple and yet the 
 most extensive field of observation imaginable. 
 With him (to repeat the definition employed in 
 Chapter I.) All is Nature that is not Art ; that 
 is, to the exclusion of all Art arising from the 
 exercise of intellect in man ; or even that 
 arising from instinct in any living creatures 
 whatever, as the nests of birds, the waxen 
 cells of bees, the hills of ants, the cocoons of 
 silk-worms, and like productions of skill and 
 labour of animated creation. 
 
 So far we have arrived at conclusions deter- 
 mining what we have to study in Nature for 
 the purposes of poetry and eloquence ; and also 
 of the extent and magnitude of the subject. At 
 present we are treating the matter as we find it, 
 in criticism rather than in poetry, such a ground- 
 work being best suited to establish the soundness 
 of the system arising out of the poet's own 
 practice, on which we shall presently enter. 
 
 The great charm of poetry of a high order is 
 its peculiar power of presenting in a novel and 
 pleasing form phases of Nature previously unob- 
 served and comparatively unseen. Whether in 
 didactic, descriptive, or dramatic poetry, such 
 applications from Nature to ethics, or song, or 
 for stage effect, become at once popular and even 
 proverbial. The superior sensibility of one poet 
 as compared with another, to be strikingly im- 
 pressed by natural objects, and his ability to 
 impress the minds of his readers with ideas of the 
 grandeur or beauty of Nature, is usually attri- 
 buted to inspiration, which after all, when 
 
58 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 philosophically considered, either has no meaning, 
 or is only another mode of expressing a sense of 
 superiority in the genius or talent of the suc- 
 cessful poet : for the mental, like the physical, 
 may be of gigantic proportions. But by attri- 
 buting every excellence in poetical compositions 
 to inspiration, we only substitute one difficulty 
 for another, by our tacit belief discourage further 
 inquiry, and leave unexplained the mode in which 
 we may study Nature so as to become acquainted 
 with its passing and commonly unnoted features, 
 as well as with those which are more tangible 
 and permanent. 
 
 As a figure of speech, the term inspiration 
 concisely expresses our estimation of Homer, 
 Virgil, Shakspeare, or Milton ; but for our 
 present purpose it is inapplicable, because it 
 excuses the study which we advocate : one which 
 must go into details, analysing and selecting from 
 Nature all that taste and judgment can indicate 
 for our choice. However inspired the artist 
 may have appeared to an observer, while engaged 
 pencil in hand on a great work, he has undoubt- 
 edly arrived at expertness and exactness through 
 sedulous attention to all the requisite preparatory 
 studies. And poets who would study Nature 
 like Raphaels and Titians, must, like them, 
 arrive at greatness through the tedium of labo- 
 rious study. 
 
 The art that enables man to see Nature 
 thoroughly in all its external forms and varying 
 aspects, and even rise still higher in the scale of 
 his observations, although it may never produce 
 a poet, irrespective of the poetic temperament, 
 
METHOD. 59 
 
 yet it will assuredly furnish most efficient aid to 
 the true poet. The feeling to apply, and the 
 manner of applying natural objects and associa- 
 tions must be so far inherent as to deserve the 
 name of inspiration ; but the faculty of utilizing 
 the more minute characteristics of Nature can 
 only be nurtured by means of well-directed 
 methodical study. 
 
 Poets have performed so much, and composed 
 so well, without any especial system in their 
 study of external Nature, that rules might appear 
 but as trammels to any precocious genius who 
 can truly say with Gray : 
 
 The meanest floweret of the vale, 
 The simplest note that swells the gale, 
 The common sun, the air, the skies, 
 To him are opening paradise. 
 
 What we contend for is, that unmethodical 
 observations of Nature, although they may be 
 exceedingly beautiful in themselves, must neces- 
 sarily be of rare occurrence ; and their multipli- 
 cation is beyond the scope of the ordinary poet. 
 The poet's range through the vast regions of 
 Nature is strangely unproductive, chiefly from 
 ignorance of some efficient means of grasping a 
 subject of such magnitude. 
 
 Let us now proceed to a few observations on 
 the study, as it has been hitherto pursued, 
 to gather from the lessons of experience some 
 useful opinions, and any proofs of elementary 
 practice that may guide us in our inquiry. 
 
 The infancy of all Arts and Sciences is marked 
 by crudeness and simplicity, and often by a 
 certain amount of debasement. Music, painting, 
 
60 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 architecture, were as rude in their commencement 
 as were astronomy, natural history, and che- 
 mistry. Poetry has passed through a similar 
 phase, and we find it at the present day a most 
 polished Art, acknowledging the fewest possible 
 rules. It sings the praises of a host of heathen 
 deities, it is great in fable, in song, in sentiment 
 and patriotism. It is the great vehicle of dra- 
 matic composition, depicting to the life man and 
 manners. Modern poets have endeavoured to 
 employ it as a vehicle for artistic presentation to 
 the mind's eye of pictorial scenery, and the cha- 
 racteristics of animated Nature. What had pre- 
 viously been regarded as the lesser ornamentations 
 en pediments and pedestals of temples and 
 monuments are now reproduced as larger works 
 of art. Where poets of old merely catalogued 
 objects in Nature, the modern poets describe and 
 etherialize, and cast a halo of glory around both 
 animate and inanimate creation. 
 
 A critique appeared in the Edinburgh Re- 
 view^ 1849, on poetical reality or truth to 
 Nature, urging on the poet attention to actual 
 nature, as something more than merely material, 
 remarking, however, that it is not to the com- 
 mon eye that Nature reveals her lore ; although 
 she offers it to all, yet it is only a c gift of genuine 
 insight ' which can penetrate into her meanings. 
 Such is the verbiage in which too many critics 
 still indulge. Why address to all, an essay that 
 can apply only to a nondescript race having 
 1 a gift of genuine insight ' ? Then Nature has 
 c meanings,' and these can be c penetrated,' pro- 
 vided the poet possess a certain gift of ' insight,' 
 
CRITICAL OPINIONS. 6 1 
 
 the secret of which can only, perhaps, be masoni- 
 cally communicated. 
 
 The true poet, (remarks Bowles) should have 
 an eye attentive and familiar with every change 
 of season, every variation of light and shade of 
 Nature, every rock, every tree, and every leaf in 
 her secret places. He who has not an eye to 
 observe these, and who cannot with a glance 
 distinguish every hue in her variety, must be so 
 far deficient in one of the essential qualities of a 
 poet. This is what Campbell calls a ' botanizing 
 perspicacity,' widely different from anything to 
 be found in the poetry of Sophocles. 
 
 In a very different tone Samuel Taylor Cole- 
 ridge, as we find recorded in his Literary 
 Remains, concludes somewhat differently. We 
 must imitate Nature ! (he exclaims, and then 
 proceeds) Yes, but what is Nature, — all and 
 everything? No, the beautiful in Nature. 
 And what then is beautiful ? What is beauty ? 
 It is in the abstract, the unity of the manifold, the 
 coalescence of the diverse ; in the concrete, it is the 
 union of the shapely [for mo sum) with the vital. 
 
 Professor Wilson,* in defending Burns against 
 the charge of deficiency in observance of Nature, 
 remarks: — The truth is that he would have 
 utterly despised most of what is now dignified 
 with the name of poetry, where harmlessly 
 enough — 
 
 Pure description takes the place of sense : 
 
 but far worse, where the agonizing artist 
 intensifies himself into genuine convulsions. 
 
 * The Land of Burns. By Professor Wilson, 2 vols. _fto. 
 Glasgow : 1840. 
 
62 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Moir, in his Lectures on our Poetical Lite- 
 rature, says regarding a set of new poetical 
 aspirants [1850] : 
 
 Who will not look upon Nature with their 
 own unassisted eyes, but are constantly inter- 
 posing some favourite medium — probably a dis- 
 torting medium. They are either making mon- 
 strous growths out of the green grass on the lap of 
 mother earth, or making new stars from the ne- 
 bulous fire-mist in the blue abyss of space above 
 their heads— their ' series of melting views ' is 
 christened transcendental philosophy. The latter- 
 day poets (as he calls them) seem principally to 
 have a desire to exhibit the influence of physical 
 nature on the operations of the fancy and in- 
 tellect ; and we have, in consequence, simply 
 their gropings amid the arcana of minds, 
 in search of those hidden links of mystery which 
 connect the seen to the unseen. But this, as the 
 general subjective material, can scarcely be termed 
 poetry. 
 
 From these, and from critical remarks generally 
 on the subject, as offering matter for the poet's 
 special study, we find a continual disagreement 
 as to what is properly to be considered Nature, 
 what its relation to Art, in what respect and to 
 what extent it is available to the poet, with an 
 intimation of mysteries to be penetrated in some 
 inscrutible way. 
 
 The criticism of De Ouincey on Wordsworth's 
 poetry, occurring in the fifth volume of his 
 works, 1862-63, is particularly interesting, 
 whether considered in reference to the subject, 
 or its author's mode of treatment. In so far as 
 
DE QUINCEY's VIEWS. 63 
 
 his remarks refer to the Study of Nature, it is 
 quite clear that De Quincey purposes doing full 
 justice to the poet, omitting nothing that can 
 tell in his favour, and particularly in reference to 
 his habit of acute observation of Nature, and for 
 his bringing c many a truth into life both for 
 the eye and for the understanding, which 
 previously had slumbered indistinctly for all 
 men.' 
 
 First, as affecting the eye, he directs attention 
 to Wordsworth's saying of a cataract seen a mile 
 off, that it was ' frozen by distance.' 
 
 Second, of twilight, he marks the poet's no- 
 ticing its abstracting power, as c daily executed 
 WJNLature through her handmaid Twilight.' 
 
 of his cloud scenery, which, if not 
 the firb. to notice, he at least considers he has 
 been the most circumstantial in his descrip- 
 tions. 
 
 Fourth, that 'he looked at natural objects 
 with the eye that neither will be dazzled from 
 without nor cheated by preconceptions from 
 within.' And 'scarcely has there been a 
 poet with what could be called an eye, or 
 an eye extensively learned, before Words- 
 worth.' 
 
 Fifth, of his sky scenery, of which De Quin- 
 cey notes three special examples. 
 
 Sixth, he says, ' as another of those natural 
 appearances which must have haunted men's 
 eyes since the Flood, but yet had never forced 
 itself into conscious notice until arrested by 
 Wordsworth, I may notice an effect of iteration 
 daily exhibited in the habits of cattle : — 
 
64 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 The cattle are grazing, 
 Their heads never raising, 
 There are forty feeding like one. 
 
 Now, merely as a fact \ and if it were nothing 
 more, this characteristic appearance in the habits 
 of cows, when all repeat the action of each, 
 ought not (he considers) to have been overlooked 
 by those who profess themselves engaged in 
 holding up a mirror to Nature. 
 
 De Quincey, in concluding his essay, remarks : 
 ' A volume might be rilled with such glimpses 
 of novelty as Wordsworth has first laid bare, 
 even with apprehension of the senses' 
 
 Now these observations serve to lay before us 
 the critic's own estimation of Nature-Study, his 
 grounds for praising particular descriptions, and 
 the features of the poet's studies that appear to 
 him most prominent, although c a volume ' 
 remains unwritten, to set forth similar ' glimpses 
 of novelty.' The poetical student would be 
 little profited through any direction to be derived 
 from such teaching as this criticism might be 
 expected to suggest. If followed, the poet must 
 look about for ' novelties ' in streams, or light, 
 or shade, or clouds, or animated nature; in 
 short, he is left as much as ever to trust to his 
 individual taste and judgment, improved by 
 education and experience. 
 
 In judging of the excellence of an entire work 
 in art (and the judicious use of Nature in poetry 
 is an Art), it is obviously not enough to pick 
 out a few morsels of such novelties as Words- 
 worth's critics present us with in proof of his 
 ability and success in the poetical study of 
 
MOIR; COLERIDGE. 65 
 
 Nature. A painter is no more to be worthily 
 distinguished for odd forms of trees and quad- 
 rupeds, or patches of colouring, than is a poet 
 for his being the first to make a few observations 
 in natural history. These are matters for the crowd 
 to admire, not distinguished graces for the art- 
 critic to extol as evidences of distinguished merit. 
 In the present instance, they are among the 
 products of a life-long study of Nature ; and it is 
 from the character of his entire poems, and not 
 from such isolated passages, that we can form 
 any just opinion of his power to present worthy 
 examples of Nature's happiest teachings. 
 
 Moir * remarks that Wordsworth philo- 
 sophises on the aspects of Nature, rather than 
 describes them ; Southey gives the landscape it- 
 self with the eye and art of a painter ; Professor 
 Wilson* s still life seems like the conjuration of a 
 dream — soft, silent, beautiful : — 
 
 Towering o'er these beauteous woods. 
 Gigantic rocks were ever dimly seen, 
 Breaking with solemn grey the tremulous green, 
 And frowning far in castellated pride : 
 While hastening to the ocean, hoary floods 
 Sent up a thin and radiant mist between, 
 Softening the beauty that it could not hide. 
 
 The resolute determination and the self-devo- 
 tion of Wordsworth (he considers) were morally 
 grand in themselves, and led to grand results — 
 the complete restoration of our poetical literature 
 to truth and nature. Coleridge, in his Biogra- 
 phia Literaria, claimed for Wordsworth, the 
 perfect truth of Nature in his images and de- 
 
 * See his Lectures on the Poetical Literature of the past 
 half -century , [1800-50], i2mo. 1856. 
 
66 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 scriptions, as taken immediately from Nature, and 
 proving a long and genial intimacy with the 
 very spirit which gives a physiognomic expression 
 to all the works of Nature. To employ his own 
 words, which are at once an instance and an 
 illustration, he does, indeed, to all thoughts and 
 to all objects, 
 
 add the gleam, 
 The light that never was on sea or land, 
 The consecration and the poet's dream. 
 
 Wordsworth's similes seldom refer to the 
 beings or things of the chronicled past; he 
 draws them from Nature, animate or inanimate, 
 and they are generally the results of personal 
 observation : — 
 
 From the bare trees, the mountains bare, 
 And grass in the green field. 
 
 The region amid which Wordsworth's life was 
 passed (adds Moir) seemed to have impressed his 
 mind with an almost superstitious dread of the 
 power of matter; it weighed upon him, 'an 
 importunate and heavy load,' and he looked 
 with a reverential fear on the forms of Nature — 
 the rugged precipice, the gloomy cavern, the 
 green pastoral hill, the ripply lake, the still, dark 
 tarn, nay, even on the moss-covered boulder- 
 stones, which are older in their associations than 
 the dawn of art, and which, mayhap, have lain 
 on the same spot, untouched and unremarked, 
 since the commencement of time. His poems 
 are made up of analyses of his own thoughts, 
 and a prevading love of Nature. In him we 
 have more of the internal power of poetry, with 
 less of the external show, than in any other 
 
WORDSWORTH. 67 
 
 writer, save perhaps Dante. He never groups for 
 effect : his subjects are the simple, the single, and 
 often the apparently barren, till they are clothed 
 with the drapery of his reflective imagination. 
 He despotically exalts the humble, and gives 
 importance to the insignificant. The Prelude 
 will be remembered for the beauty and exquisite 
 diction of some of the descriptive passages. 
 These are comparable to anything within the 
 compass of English blank-verse composition ; 
 and are fresh interpretations of Nature, passing 
 directly from the intellect and imagination of 
 the poet into the reader's memory, where they 
 remain imprinted and imperishable. 
 
 Among Wordsworth's most able critics occur 
 the names of Jeffrey, Gifford, Southey, Lock- 
 hart, Hazlitt, Landor, De Quincey, S. T. Cole- 
 ridge, with numerous other writers; but all alike 
 disappoint us when we seek to obtain from them 
 any insight into the Wordsworth ian philosophy. 
 Each from his own point of observation finds, 
 as he conceives, a key to influences of Nature 
 on the poet's mind, with their results as exempli- 
 fied in his poetry. Coleridge claims for Words- 
 worth an intimacy with ' the very spirit which 
 gives a physiognomic expression to all the works 
 of Nature.' But is there any such c spirit' in 
 stocks and stones, and other inanimate objects in 
 Nature? We can comprehend a man under- 
 standing his own mind, and conceiving its 
 spirituality to any degree of power and refine- 
 ment ; but c the very spirit ' of the globe he 
 inhabits is too problematical for human intelli- 
 gence to grasp; and it may be doubted whether the 
 
 f 2 
 
68 .NATURE- STUDY. 
 
 critic himself could have explained what he meant 
 by c the very spirit' (in Nature) which gives a phy- 
 siognomic expression to the Alps, Derwentwater, 
 the small Celandine, or any other natural object. 
 
 Moir finds that the poet's mind was impressed 
 c with an almost superstitious dread of the col- 
 lective power of matter.' And he alludes 
 to The Prelude as containing descriptions 
 which c are fresh interpretations of Nature.' 
 Here again we have ' interpretations ' used 
 perhaps in the sense intended by Lord Bacon, 
 but as here applied really explaining nothing. 
 If Nature is a veritable book, then like 
 other books it may at some date or other be 
 partially interpreted ; but for the purposes 
 intended, the proposed explanation goes for 
 nothing. The employment of such language 
 may be very suggestive to many minds, and to 
 some may be all the more gratifying from its 
 mysteriousness, leaving full play to the imagina- 
 tion ; but to write thus is adopting a licence 
 scarcely allowable in prose composition. 
 
 Our reason for dwelling at such length on the 
 works of one poet is that, few poetical writers 
 during the last half-century have given occasion 
 to so much critical discussion. And yet to the 
 present time no critic has offered any suggestions 
 that develope a course of Nature-Study, either as 
 traceable to the works of poets generally, or even 
 to Wordsworth, although engaged in representing 
 him as imbued with its c spirit,' as being its 
 ' interpreter,' as viewing it c almost with awe and 
 superstition,' and feeling it as c a power,' ' a pre- 
 sence,' and affecting him like one c possessed.' 
 
UNRELIABLE CRITICISM. 69 
 
 There has been an affectation to speak of him as 
 all soul, and all eye, and tender- feeling for 
 Nature ; but no one has thrown aside the lauda- 
 tory style to address to us a few words of plain 
 common sense. Whoever has read ancient 
 works of philosophy and of science will see 
 reflected therein the very kind of laudatory ex- 
 pression against which we are desirous to warn 
 writers and readers on the subject of Nature. 
 
 The study of Nature, with special reference to 
 the purposes of poetry and eloquence, is an Art 
 which may be said to accept aid from every 
 source of knowledge ; to adopt and to absorb all 
 it receives, yielding in return the many magic 
 products of the tuneful muse. At the same time 
 the Poet's Study of Nature is, as we have before 
 observed, one of the widest possible range, and 
 in some form or other can never have wholly 
 escaped his attention ; and however imperfect 
 the impressions of poets who lived when the art 
 was in its infancy, still as time rolled on, and 
 the art became better understood, the advancing 
 ages accumulated large treasures of the poet's 
 gifted delineations of human and of external 
 Nature ; and it is from literary stores thus 
 amassed from age to age that man may best 
 acquire a system of Nature-Study. 
 
 The means and opportunities for pursuing 
 and enlarging our Study of Nature have been 
 considerably augmented even within the last 
 century. Humboldt, losing no opportunity of 
 endeavouring to imbue his readers with a love of 
 Nature, impresses on their attention every form 
 of advantage intellectually and physically. He 
 
7© NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 especially notices in his Cosmos that, in reflecting 
 upon the different degrees of enjoyment presented 
 to us in the contemplation of Nature, we. find 
 that the first place must be assigned to a sensa- 
 tion, which is wholly independent of an intimate 
 acquaintance with the physical phenomena pre- 
 sented to our view, or of the peculiar character 
 of the region surrounding us. In the uniform 
 plain bounded only by a distant horizon, where 
 the lowly heather, the cistus, or waving grasses, 
 deck the soil ; — on the ocean shore, where the 
 waves, softly rippling over the beach, leave a 
 track, green with the weeds of the sea ; — every- 
 where, the mind is penetrated by the same sense 
 of the grandeur and vast expanse of Nature, 
 revealing to the soul, by a mysterious inspiration, 
 the existence of laws that regulate the forces of 
 the universe. In his Cosmos, and in his Views 
 of Nature, Humboldt has done more than any 
 writer to familiarise us with the striking scenes 
 and phenomena of Nature in tropical regions, 
 pleasingly, truthfully, and scientifically described, 
 yet with sufficient generalization to be acceptable 
 to all who seek trustworthy information on im- 
 portant facts, remote from their own experience. 
 It would be both gratifying and instructive to 
 possess reliable evidence of the practice of poets 
 in their first rough draughts and essays — collect- 
 ing, amplifying, arranging, and polishing such 
 ideas as were strictly due to their personal im- 
 pressions of Nature. One lesson we should most 
 likely learn would be the fact of their loftiest 
 and most pleasing imaginings being first presented 
 to them in a very prosaic form. It has already 
 
POETS STUDIES. 7 1 
 
 been noticed that the author of The Seasons was 
 accustomed to rural wanderings both by night 
 and day. We can well conceive that many of 
 Pope's best lines touching Nature were committed 
 to paper among very different materials of 
 thought, when the poet called for his midnight 
 taper. Young's poems may equally have resulted 
 from a habit of noting vagrant thoughts, and 
 thence may have arisen his : — 
 
 Tired Nature's sweet restorer, balmy sleep ! 
 
 Or the lines : — 
 
 The spider's most attenuated thread 
 Is cord, is cable, to man's tender tie 
 On earthly bliss ; it breaks at every breeze. 
 
 Or those oft misquoted ones : — 
 
 To know the world, not love her, is thy point : 
 She gives but little, nor that little long. 
 
 Sir Walter Scott would note down the flowrets 
 of mountain and vale to verify his scenery, 
 and he mostly went fresh from the fields and 
 the wood-lands direct to the composing of his 
 fascinating prose romances and pleasant min- 
 strelsy. 
 
 Studious poets have no doubt frequently noted 
 
 for future adoption some striking scene while yet 
 
 under their observation, as we find by his Omniana 
 
 was a custom with S. T. Coleridge, where he 
 
 records : — 
 
 December Morning. The giant shadows sleeping amid 
 the wan yellow light of the December morning, looked like 
 wrecks and scattered ruins of the long, long night. 
 
 That Dr. Southey was minutely observant of 
 external Nature under various aspects is con- 
 spicuous from the frequent notes interspersed 
 
J2 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 throughout his Common-place Book, edited by 
 Dr. J. W. Warter, 1850-51, an example so rare 
 and interesting, that we shall present his notes, 
 omitting only a few that he had adopted in his 
 poems, or which did not appear sufficiently 
 striking. There will necessarily always be unre- 
 corded associations in every diarist's notes, without 
 which the spirit of a first sketch loses much of 
 its interest to a stranger ; at the same time, curt 
 as they are, they afford unequivocal evidence of 
 the kind of materials in natural scenery and 
 objects that the refined taste of the poet in this 
 instance conceived capable of poetical appropria- 
 tion. Perhaps these notes are like the studies of 
 all poets in the same field of observation, random 
 records of whatever strikes them as beautiful, 
 grand, or novel in Nature, while under the influ- 
 ence of first direct impressions, and which such 
 memoranda were capable of recalling, associated 
 with much of the pleasure originally expe- 
 rienced. 
 
 In volume 4, commencing at page 200, there 
 are among others the following Images, which 
 we number consecutively to assist in making 
 any future references. 
 
 1. Green of the copse-covered hill, broken 
 
 like the waters of a still lake. 
 
 2. Evening. A flight of small birds, only 
 
 visible by the glitter of their wings. 
 
 3. In the evening the harshest sounds are har- 
 
 monized by distance. The very bark of a 
 far-off dog is musical. 
 
 4. August 25. It is the plane that hangs down 
 
 its globular seeds. 
 
southey's diary. 
 
 5. The swan in swimming arches back his serpent 
 
 neck, and reclines his head between his 
 wings. His wings are a little onened, as 
 sail-like to catch the wind ; his breast pro- 
 truded like a prow. This bird is beautiful 
 from its colour and habits ; for it is clumsy 
 in shape, and of most foul physiognomy ; 
 there is such a snakishness in its eye and 
 head, as well as neck. 
 
 6. The leaves of the holly are prickly only when 
 
 they are within reach of cattle ; higher up 
 they preserve their waviness. [And so on.] 
 
 7. Beautiful appearance of the ash when the 
 
 moon shines through it, particularly its 
 edge. 
 
 8. The moon seems to roll through the rifted 
 
 clouds. 
 
 9. Oct. 2. The ivy now begins to bloom, the 
 
 flower appears globular. [And so on.] 
 
 10. Morning. Mist-shower from the elms and 
 
 thick- leaved trees. 
 
 1 1 . Whiteness of the rocks occasioned by the 
 
 lichens. 
 
 12. The grass grey with dew. 
 
 13. Oct. 10. Rich appearance of the fern in 
 
 the wood. 
 
 14. The acorns brown ripe, or ripening yellow. 
 
 15. Of the various trees, I observe only the ash 
 
 uniform in its fading colour, pale yellowing 
 green. Its leaves rise very beautifully, 
 light as a lady's plumes. 
 
 16. A path so little frequented, that the leaves 
 
 lay on it untrodden, light as they had 
 fallen. 
 
74 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 17. The horse-chesnut rich in Autumn. 
 
 18. In the forest of Dean, I saw no trees more 
 
 richly varied than the beech, standing singly, 
 and with room to spread. 
 
 19. The leaves of tjie reed spread out straight 
 
 on the wind, like ship streamers. 
 
 20. The darker and more tempestuous the night, 
 
 the more luminous the sea to the leeward of 
 the vessel. 
 
 2 1 . A vessel when first seen at sea, appears to be 
 
 ascending. 
 
 22. Odd appearance of the cobwebs on a frosty 
 
 morning. 
 
 23. In a hoar morning the cattle track their 
 
 feeding path by their breath thawing the 
 frost. 
 
 24. A clouded morning after snow. The line 
 
 of hill scarcely to be distinguished from the 
 sky by being lighter. 
 
 25. Rime on the trees. 
 
 26. Sparkling of the snow. 
 
 27. White frost on the stone wall, but none on 
 
 the moss in its interstices, as though the 
 force of vegetable life repelled it. 
 
 28. Move where you will at sea, the long line 
 
 of moonlight still meets your eye. 
 
 29. When the wind follows the sun, it omens 
 
 fair weather, and vice versa. 
 
 30. April 25. The petals of the pilewort grow 
 
 white when over-blown. The first buds of 
 the ash are black,* they then redden, and 
 appear not unlike the valerian flower, a 
 cluster of red seeds. 
 
 * Also noticed by Tennyson. 
 
southey's diary. 75 
 
 31. The horse-chestnut buds covered with gum, 
 
 and woolly within. 
 
 32. The cry of the bat comes so short and quick 
 as to be felt in the ear like a tremulous 
 touch. 
 
 t,^. At evening the reflection of the bridge on 
 the water was strong as reality, and blended 
 with the bridge into one pile. 
 
 34. After a battle — the bank weeds of the 
 
 stream bloody. 
 
 35. Tameness of the birds where gunpowder is 
 
 unknown. 
 
 36. The sound of a running brook like distant 
 
 voices. 
 
 37. There is a sort of vegetable that grows in 
 
 the water like a green mist or fog. 
 
 38. Holly — its white bark. 
 
 39. Beech in autumn — its upmost branches stript 
 
 first and all pointed upwards. 
 
 40. Moss on the cot-thatch the greenest object. 
 
 41. Redness of the hawthorn with its berries. 
 
 42. Water, like polished steel, dark, or splendid. 
 
 43. Trees, like men, grow stiff with age ; their 
 
 brittle boughs break in the storm — a light 
 breeze moves only their leaves. * * * 
 
 44. I have seen the yellow leaves of the ash and 
 
 birch in Autumn give a sunshiny appear- 
 ance to the trees — a hectic beauty. * * 
 
 45. Sept. 28. Crackling of the furze-pods in a 
 
 hot day. 
 
 46. Trees are grey by torchlight. 
 
 47. The clouds spot the sea with purple. * * 
 
 48. The ripe redness of the grass. * * * 
 
 49. The flags sword leaves. * * * * * 
 
76 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 50. The reed-rustling breeze. 
 
 51. The sea like burnished silver. Morning. 
 
 52. April 23. The blossoms swept from the 
 
 fruit-tree like a shower of snow. * * 
 
 53. I observed the motion of the corn most 
 
 like the sparkling of a stream in the sun. 
 
 54. Sunset, seen through a grove of firs. * 
 
 55. Green light of the evening sky where it 
 
 last lingers. 
 
 The following are offered as similes : — 
 
 56. An uncharitable man to the desert — which 
 
 receives the sunbeams and the rain, and 
 returns no increase. 
 5 7. Meet adversity — like the cedar in the snow. 
 
 58. Sorrow, misfortunes. — I have seen a dark 
 
 cloud that threatened to hide the moon 
 grow bright as it passed over her, and only 
 make her more beautiful. Aug. 7. Cintra, 
 1 1 at night. ***** 
 
 59. Desertion — weeds seeding in the garden or 
 
 courtyard, or on the altar. * * * * 
 
 60. The wind hath a human voice. 
 
 61. Grass twinkling with the morning dew. 
 
 We have thus presented to our minds many 
 unconnected observations on appearances of the 
 sun and moon, of clouds and dew, of the sea 
 and still waters, of wind and sky ; but most of 
 all about vegetation as noticed in the fern, 
 hawthorn, holly, birch, elm, ash, and plane tree ; 
 likewise in corn, grass, pilewort, lichens, leaves, 
 blossoms, and seeds ; also in the swan, birds, bat, 
 and other objects. From all these the poet was 
 provided with images and similes ; but by what 
 
PROSAIC NOTES. 77 
 
 process to be wrought out, or whether left to 
 suitable states of mind, and natural impulses, 
 unaided by any premeditated process, must for 
 ever remain merely matter for conjecture. Pro- 
 bably enough his process was as unmethodical 
 as his course of observations was desultory. He 
 notes that still water shines like ' steel,' and the 
 sea like ' silver ' ; the wind has a c human voice,' 
 and the barking of a dog becomes ' musical ' by 
 distance ; which latter observations amount to 
 what should suffice to mark him for fame, 
 according to the tone of modern criticism. 
 
 These prosaic examples of Nature-Study are 
 not only exceedingly interesting in themselves, but 
 they effectively illustrate the poet's conception 
 of the means he found it best to pursue to attain 
 his object ; and these brief notes are in their way, 
 not unlike the first rough draughts of figures and 
 objects, or the smallest portions of any of them 
 dashed off by the artist to serve for after appli- 
 cation to his elaborate compositions. It would 
 be fortunate for our present purpose did we 
 possess more of such proofs of poetic hints, or of 
 subjects in Nature promising to be of poetical 
 utility. In particular we should be curious to 
 learn more than we know, or can conjecture, 
 of Wordsworth's intellectual process in his study 
 of Nature. It is not without some diffidence 
 that we venture to quote what he advances in 
 his poem, although appearing to be unequivo- 
 cally expressive of his personal sentiments. He 
 may or may not have chosen to express his views 
 completely : at the same time it is quite certain 
 that he would not express without censure, what 
 
78 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 he writes as a poet, that was not strictly in 
 agreement with his own tenets. Without there- 
 fore pressing the argument too far in favour of 
 the poet's words being an exposition of his own 
 doctrine, it is at least interesting to observe how 
 he treats of the subject in respect to influences of 
 Nature, through the persons of his poem in 
 The Excursion. He relates of the Old Pedlar 
 that in respect to Nature : — 
 
 While yet a child, and long before his time, 
 Had he perceived the presence and the power 
 Of greatness ; 
 
 Then as to his mode of studying Nature : — 
 
 in the after-day 
 
 Of boyhood, many an hour in caves forlorn, 
 And 'mid the hollow depths of naked crags 
 He sate, and even in their fixed lineaments, 
 Or from the power of a peculiar eye, 
 Or by creative feeling overborne, 
 Or by predominance of thought oppressed, 
 Even in their fixed and steady lineaments 
 He traced an ebbing and a flowing mind, 
 Expression ever varying ! 
 
 Thus informed, 
 He had small need of books ; — 
 
 The young herdsman, as he then was, is de- 
 scribed as deficient in 
 
 the pure delight of love 
 
 By sound diffused, or by the breathing air, 
 Or by the silent look of happy things, 
 Or flowing from the universal face 
 Of earth and sky. But he had felt the power 
 Of nature, and already was prepared, 
 By his intense conceptions, to receive 
 Deeply the lesson deep of love which he, 
 Whom nature, by whatever means, has taught 
 To feel intensely , cannot but receive. 
 
 He proceeds : — 
 
 A Herdsman on the lonely mountain tops, 
 Such intercourse was his, and in this sort 
 Was his existence oftentimes possessed. 
 
WORDSWORTH'S EXCURSION. 79 
 
 The Herdsman is represented as reading and 
 revering the Scriptures : — 
 
 But in the mountains did he feel his faith. 
 There did he see the writing ; all things there 
 Breathed immortality, revolving life, 
 And greatness still revolving ; infinite : 
 There littleness was not ; the least of things 
 
 Seemed infinite 
 
 * * * * 
 
 while in the hollow vale, 
 
 Hollow and green, he lay on the green turf 
 
 In pensive idleness. 
 
 * * * # 
 
 Yet, still uppermost, 
 
 Nature was at his heart as if he felt, 
 Though yet he knew not how, a wasting power 
 In all things which from her sweet influence 
 Might tend to wean him. Therefore with her hues, 
 Her forms, and with the spirit of her forms, 
 
 He clothed the nakedness of austere truth. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 . before his 18th year 
 
 Accumulated feelings pressed his heart 
 
 With an increasing weight ; he was o'erpowered 
 
 By Nature ; 
 
 And the first virgin passion of a soul 
 Communing with the glorious universe. 
 Full often wished he that the winds might rage 
 When they were silent : far more fondly now 
 Than in his earlier season did he love 
 Tempestuous nights — the conflict and the sounds 
 That live in darkness. 
 
 * * * >:< 
 
 he scanned the laws of light 
 
 Amid the roar of torrents, where they send 
 From hollow clefts up to the clearer air 
 A cloud of mist, that in the sunshine frames 
 A lasting tablet — for the observer's eye 
 Varying its rainbow hues. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 * * * * 
 
 * * * * 
 Amid the bounties of the year, the peace 
 And liberty of nature ; 
 
80 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 We would here observe generally, and in con- 
 clusion, that the poet's study of Nature is more 
 than merely artistic ; he does more than depict 
 Nature's outward forms. He looks on Nature as a 
 divinity which accords to different minds varying 
 influences dependent on the poet's own sensibi- 
 lity to beauty, harmony, and grandeur. He is 
 bound by no laws to mete out and analyse gross 
 matter. His eye is turned on Nature from the 
 heliocentric point of view ; and the forms and 
 constitution of matter are appreciated by him 
 only as we appreciate the stars, for what they 
 are, and not for ignoble uses and practical ends. 
 He holds the mirror up to Nature, but disdains 
 the employment of a microscope. Poetry is an 
 art, and not a science ; while science has its own 
 province, and is neither to be confounded with art 
 nor poetry. Poetry has reigned untrammelled 
 in its employment of Nature for many centuries, 
 and therefore its own usages can alone prescribe 
 its own laws and limits. 
 
( 8i ) 
 
 Chapter III. 
 
 The absence of methodized Nature-Study; Wordsworth's 
 works leave his Philosophy open to dispute ; methodical 
 study insisted on : a study independent of science ; 
 generalization an important elementary step ; figurative 
 language ; its indebtedness to Nature ; examples from 
 Prose Writers ; modes suggested for classifying figures 
 from Nature. 
 
 The lapse of centuries not having sufficed to 
 originate any definite method of studying Na- 
 ture to aid the poet and the orator, when taken 
 in connection with the conflicting opinions of 
 critics, may have confirmed many an inquiring 
 mind in the belief that the subject was one 
 beyond the power of human ability to master, 
 so as to be able to methodize any really practical ' 
 system. If to be accomplished, it might be 
 argued, to what authority can we point in 
 modern times, as more likely to instruct us 
 through the medium of his life and works, than 
 Wordsworth : a poet who, as he died at 80 years 
 of age, was for more than half a century one of 
 Nature's most constant votaries ? Unfortunately, 
 however, he has not left us in prose anything 
 approaching to a philosophy of Nature, in the 
 broad sense of the term ; and what we gather 
 from his poems as being a practical process is so 
 problematical that it would be impossible for 
 commentators on his method of study, as taken 
 from that source, to agree on any specific method. 
 Does the poet of Nature indeed require few 
 
 G 
 
82 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 books other than the book of Nature ? Will 
 early rising or late lying down, and constant 
 living among and ruminating on surrounding 
 dead and living and ever-changing creation, 
 suffice to impart a full knowledge of Nature ? 
 Or, can the poet obtain a knowledge of Nature 
 living principally in a city, perhaps in an attic ? 
 Questions such as these suggest themselves at 
 every stage of our search. 
 
 The adoption of system has not destroyed 
 originality of conception in Music, Painting, or 
 Sculpture, and it cannot curtail poetical genius, to 
 which it rather opens an enlarged sphere of ope- 
 ration. But every poet has a dread of being 
 trammelled by systematized rules. The study 
 itself however is quite apart from the practice to 
 which it may lead ; which will differ with dif- 
 ferent students. Not all writers and orators 
 employ alike the same language and the figura- 
 tive speech which they may have learned from 
 the same Professors of Philology. 
 
 From what has been advanced, it is evident 
 that we must discard any idea of separation or 
 subdivisions, receiving some and discarding other 
 works of Creation. 
 
 It is not the Poet but the Philosopher, the man 
 of science, who parcels out Nature into Astro- 
 nomy, Meteorology, Geography, Geology, Mine- 
 ralogy, Botany, Zoology, Chemistry, and nu- 
 merous other branches affording subdivision of 
 labour in abstruse studies of Nature. 
 
 The Study of Nature as exemplified in the 
 productions of the Poet or the Orator are distin- 
 guished more by common sense refined and 
 
GENERALIZATION. 83 
 
 enlarged by education, than by scientific accuracy : 
 a peculiarity which has not hitherto attracted 
 sufficient notice to lead to any important inves- 
 tigation ; and yet it is one of paramount impor- 
 tance to the poet. Poets do not, as a rule, write 
 for poets ; much less for the scholar devoted to 
 scientific pursuits ; but, addressing the common 
 ear of the public, they appeal to the common eye 
 and common sense of illiterate as well as polished 
 society. Poets who, like Darwin and his admirers 
 and imitators, have adopted a scientific system 
 in their botanical and other compositions in verse, 
 have signally failed of popularity. 
 
 We are not here considering to what extent 
 Nature-Study can be available in poetry generally; 
 it is sufficient that when the poet's taste attracts 
 him into that region he should find it not a 
 waste-howling wilderness, but a mine, a garden, 
 a treasure-house stored beyond the power of his 
 imagination and fancy to exhaust. 
 
 Generalization is the first or elementary 
 step in Nature- Study. To render the study 
 of external Nature serviceable for the purposes 
 intended, we must adopt that classification which 
 is most compact and comprehensive, and which 
 promises to be effective. AVhen generalizing, we 
 speak of fire, water, earth, and air ; or of rocks, 
 plains, forests, and seas : or of man, animals, 
 birds, fishes, reptiles, and insects. 
 
 The Poet in his ample range of Nature-Study 
 has before his mental vision the entire globe he 
 inhabits, rolling through infinite space in its 
 aerial ocean, amidst unimagined glories. He is 
 indifferent as to the precise number of the 
 
 G 2 
 
84 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 elements in Nature; he records no minute 
 admeasurements, enters into no exact calculations, 
 and spurns laying down the graduated stratifi- 
 cations of the earth's crust, or precise classifica- 
 tions of plants and animate creation. His 
 admiration of the heavens has never aided 
 astronomical observations ; and he is enraptured 
 with each season of the year, without consulting 
 meteorological tables. He deals only with un- 
 disputed facts, patent to age and youth, the 
 highest and plainest orders of intellect ; in daily 
 occurrences, and the common stock of knowledge 
 of every-day life, disturbing no man's judgment, 
 and yet surprising and delighting mankind like 
 the sun in April, the rainbow after a shower, 
 or moonlight after nights of gloomy darkness. 
 
 Thus viewed, Nature-Study is replete with 
 commonplaces, as well as sublimities; and not the 
 least pleasing to human nature are those objects 
 from which flow the earliest teachings of our 
 common parent. Poets and moralists avail 
 themselves of even this simply expressed love of 
 Nature to present to our minds some new and 
 agreeable versions of the purity of snow, the 
 industry of bees, the perfume of the rose, or 
 other familiar fact. As, however, iteration is 
 far from being an exhaustive process, poets by 
 adopting it have left all the more treasure 
 unexpended, and its plenteous sources almost 
 unexplored. 
 
 It will be requisite here to state our present 
 knowledge and application of Nature as deve- 
 loped through the medium of our language, not 
 only in ordinary speech, in the eloquence of the 
 
METAPHOR. 85 
 
 pulpit, the bar, or the stage; but likewise in 
 poetical writings. To do this effectually, a fund 
 of evidence must be accumulated too powerful 
 to be resisted. As we must consider the subject 
 addressed to all classes of society, we consider it 
 important to adduce the greatest possible variety 
 of illustration ; although it must be admitted that 
 from Shakspeare alone might be drawn a fund 
 of evidence, almost of itself sufficiently con- 
 clusive. 
 
 The infusion into our ordinary language of 
 expressions associated with natural objects, gives 
 rise to a metaphorical style of speech and 
 writing. Professor Max Miiller* distinguishes 
 two kinds of metaphor, the one radical, the 
 other poetical. By radical he means any root 
 that having a definite meaning is nevertheless 
 variously applied ; as, to shine, employed in 
 relation to the sun, fire, spring, morning, 
 thought, joy, &c. But by poetical metaphor 
 he understands the transference of nouns or 
 verbs, such as 'fingers,' to express the sun's rays; 
 ' star,' w r hen applied to a flower ; ' ship,' to a 
 cloud ; to call the sun, ' horse,' &c. 
 
 Nature presents to our senses abundant objects 
 and phenomena that associate admirably with 
 human thought and language in the utterance 
 of forcible expression. Had we no other than 
 a knowledge of the four elements, as awarded 
 to Nature by an ancient school of philosophy, 
 it is surprising what extensive use we can make 
 of them. Fire in every form and degree would 
 
 * See his Lectures on the Science of Language, Second 
 Series, 8vo, 1S64. 
 
86 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 stimulate our imagination, and we should find 
 in ourselves or our fellow creatures fiery dis- 
 position, hot displeasure, heated fancy, light of 
 knowledge, dark ignorance, &c. Water in like 
 manner would lead to a different arrangement 
 of ideas, and we might in allusion to it speak 
 of the bubble fame, misty speech, torrents of 
 abuse, the tide of opinion, a shower of praise. 
 Earth would suggest — groundless charges, flinty- 
 hearted, iron-fisted, root and branch, fruits of 
 experience, brute force, lynx-eyed, &c. While 
 Air would supply a plenitude of — airy no- 
 things, stormy debate, thunders of applause, 
 and the like. 
 
 If instead of that division we take any other, 
 as for example, Animal Nature, we should then 
 have — lion-hearted, lamb-like, wolfish eyes, 
 bowels of compassion, hunger after knowledge, 
 food for the mind, thirsting for revenge, flying 
 from danger, hatching mischief, growth in good 
 or evil, &c. 
 
 Language abounds in words which are sy- 
 nonymously used in reference to mind and 
 matter; for instance — dark, light, cultivated, 
 enriched, pregnant, fruitful, barren, with many 
 others. Whether we speak of a cultivated 
 mind, or cultivated ground ; a dark under- 
 standing, or a dark night, no confusion of ideas 
 can possibly ensue, for on the contrary the dis- 
 tinctions intended to be drawn are defined thus 
 in a clearer and livelier manner. 
 
 We wish to show the most simple form in 
 which language is associated with objects and 
 facts appertaining to the external world, irre- 
 
NATURAL OBJECTS. 87 
 
 spective of the speaker or writer having in view- 
 any narrative or description of material Nature. 
 The speaker may charge an adversary with the 
 bloodthirstiness of the tiger ; and having 
 named such an animal, or from its being present 
 to his mind, he may use words indirectly derived 
 from that creature's nature and habits, giving 
 rise to strength, sinews, claws, power, fangs, 
 jaws, swiftness, speed, lying in wait; which taken 
 alone would appear irrespective of the creature 
 that suggested their employment. And, there- 
 fore, the same use of language might follow, 
 although the creature giving rise to them had 
 never been named, but had only been reflected 
 in the speaker's mind without any direct refer- 
 ence to distinguish any particular savage animal. 
 The same remarks will apply to any other 
 subject, whether expressed, implied, or only 
 figuratively present to the speaker's mind. What- 
 ever words impress us with an idea of objects 
 in Nature, or their properties, or circumstances 
 appertaining to them, or that lead to the impres- 
 sion that such statements can only relate to an 
 animal, or a vegetable, or inert matter, and the 
 like, is directly or indirectly due to Nature. 
 All other words are of artificial construction, 
 such as temple, altar, goddess, satyr, garland, 
 vest, crown, pen, paper, book. 
 
 Let us now turn, for a practical illustration, to 
 the first ten pages of the first volume of Lord 
 Macaulay's History of England, 1856, which, 
 from the grave character of the subject, cannot 
 be expected to afford any very flowery expres- 
 sions, or other than a chaste yet characteristic 
 
88 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 example of verbal construction. He writes 
 (page 8):— 
 
 Men still living — the course of — long struggle — bound 
 up together — sprung — rapidly rose — grew together — a gi- 
 gantic — sinks into — less splendid — more durable — gave 
 birth — a withered and disturbed member adding no strength 
 to the body — feared or envied — the breasts of — a golden 
 age — decay — man — the rise and fall of — through ages — 
 pass (rapidly) — the tongue of — drove out — speech — dis- 
 solved — the other hand — listened — serpents — the air — the 
 ground — the darkness begins to (break) — lost to view — 
 brute violence — sunk in — physical force — corporeal strength 
 — narrow-minded — the dark ages — vigour of muscle — the 
 fiercest — uncleared woods — female — plants and minerals — 
 darkness and tempest — the deluge — feeble germ — to spring 
 — productive — grew up — seas and mountains — glittering — 
 to pour forth — ferocity — coast — island — the sun — stream 
 of — begun to rise, was met by this blow, and sank down. 
 
 We have here words and expressions allusive 
 or distinctly applying to human, animal, reptile, 
 vegetable, and mineral creation ; together with 
 celestial and other phenomena. 
 
 The same eloquent writer in his Essays, 1850, 
 criticising Moore's Life of Lord Byron, affords 
 the following selection : — 
 
 Clear and manly (style) — rises into eloquence — without 
 effort — so little pain — the living — a large circle — stiffness — 
 nature — deep and painful — sad and dark — being softened — 
 strength and weakness (of his intellect) — rage — tender- 
 ness — caresses — deformity — the world — his mother — child 
 of nature — a crowd — his feet — dizzy — eminence — men — ■ 
 women — this world — youth — passions — love — the flash and 
 outbreak of that — fiery mind which glowed — fondness — 
 rage — tangible — the howl of — the sea — the Alps — with tears 
 — his face — the shores of the Adriatic — picturesque — 
 brightest of skies — brightest of seas — the vice — a race — 
 wild — bitter disdain. 
 
 From the character of the subject the language 
 is here more indebted to human than to external 
 Nature ; but it is offered as an example, without 
 
PROSE COMPOSITIONS. 89 
 
 preference for the matter, as being every way 
 sufficient to exemplify the degree to which 
 language is affected by associations with the 
 outer world. 
 
 Very different in its strain and style is a 
 specimen selected from the first fifteen pages of 
 the Inaugural Address of Mr. Thomas Carlyle, 
 as Rector of the University, Edinburgh, j866: 
 
 The vineyard — it grows — this world — the heart — young 
 men— yours is the golden season of life — the seed-time 
 of life — if you sow tares instead of wheat, — the season when 
 you are young in years, — the whole mind is, as it were 
 fluid, — talk — the mind — hardens gradually, to the con- 
 sistency of rock or of iron — an old man — transparent 
 — the outside skin — this universe — (with) fruit — darken 
 counsel by — words — flocked — the man speaking to you vo- 
 cally — the culture of — populations — their eye — the deepest 
 heads — what is the nature of this stupendous universe, — 
 this wonderful universe — races of men in the world — shin- 
 ing — utter darkness — face to face — beautiful and sunny — 
 deep-toned — features — flying away — take the lion by the 
 beard. 
 
 The language here employed concerns human 
 nature and conveys advice to the rising genera- 
 tion of young men to cultivate their under- 
 standings. . The speaker, keeping universal 
 Nature in mind, presents us with its seasons and 
 its animal and vegetable kingdoms with their 
 products and properties, from whence he draws 
 a consequent style of expression to enforce his 
 arguments in favour of mental cultivation. 
 
 We find in such a fictitious narrative as The 
 Old Curiosity Shop, by Mr. Charles Dickens, a 
 more copious use is made of these direct draughts 
 from Nature; for example, in the first half of 
 the first chapter we meet with : — 
 
 Old — night — walking — summer — morning — fields and 
 lanes — days or weeks — the country — after dark — Heaven — 
 
90 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 I love its light — it sheds upon the earth — any creature 
 living — fallen — The glare and hurry of broad noon — a 
 glimpse of passing faces — the light of — night — day — air- 
 built — tread of feet — a sick man — footsteps — pain and 
 weariness — the child's step — the man's — the stream of life 
 — pouring on — restless dreams — dead — the water — green 
 banks which grow wider and wider — broad vast sea — lie 
 sleeping in the sun — in the spring or summer — when the 
 fragrance of sweet flowers is in the air — streams of — driving 
 the dusty thrush — all night long — Poor bird ! — watered — 
 filled their breasts with visions of the country — a soft sweet 
 voice — a pretty little girl — a very long way — brought a tear 
 into the child's clear eye — look at my face — her very small 
 and delicate frame — youthfulness — her quick eye — growing 
 more — I love these little people — clapping her hands — 
 running on — very dark and silent — a faint light — a little 
 old man with long grey hair, whose face and figure, as he 
 held the light above his head, and looked before him — his 
 spare and slender form — Their bright blue eyes — his face 
 — deeply furrowed — the public eye — The haggard aspect of 
 the little old man — in his face — shaking his head — fixed 
 his eyes upon the fire — her light brown hair hanging loose 
 about her neck, and her face flushed — few grown persons 
 — the ways of life — infants — the springs are deep — my arm 
 — he cried — laugh — childlike — smiling — lad — wide mouth, 
 very red cheeks, a turned-up nose — (comical) face — his 
 hand — stood — the boy — his voice — a loud roar — his mouth 
 wide open, and his eyes nearly shut, laughing violently — 
 the child's bright eyes were dimmed with tears — fulness 
 of heart — put her arm about his neck — Do I love thee ? — 
 her caresses, and laid her head upon his breast — sob — 
 swallowing — bawled — patting the child's cheek — his teeth 
 — his knees — midnight — her eyes lighting up — above 
 ground — opening his mouth, and shutting his eyes. 
 
 The nature of the subject in this instance will 
 account for the liberal use of words suggested by 
 human nature, and other objects. It could 
 scarcely be otherwise, in giving an account of 
 the old man, little girl, the boy, with requisite 
 human associations. It must be remembered 
 however, that the story is laid in the dingy 
 town, and not in a rural district, yet observe the 
 writer's ability in throwing over a dull, dusty, 
 
PROSE COMPOSITIONS. 9 1 
 
 uninviting neighbourhood, the halo of his genius, 
 and making a country where no country exists. 
 What a charm there is in ' summer fields and 
 lanes, the country, green banks, heaven ; ' and 
 how redolent the air with ' the fragrance of 
 sweet flowers.' 
 
 The literature of history, politics, and law, 
 is usually described as dry ; and this expression 
 might be applied to the great body of works 
 relating to the philosophy of the mind, and to 
 sciences generally ; of which even Dr. Johnson 
 must have felt conscious, when he spoke of ' the 
 dusty deserts of barren philology.' But as the 
 subjects of literary composition recede from rigid 
 and severe studies, in the same proportion do 
 they become more open to be allied to external 
 nature, and to assume a lighter air, and even a 
 flowery expression. 
 
 From the first 20 pages of A Chapter of 
 Autobiography, by the Rt. Hon. W. E. Glad- 
 stone, M.P., 1868, we quote the following, 
 partly in support of the foregoing statement, 
 the subject being both political and personal ; 
 and from so distinguished a classical scholar, we 
 have a composition in that severe classical style, 
 which is farthest removed from a general asso- 
 ciation with external natural objects, if we except 
 human Nature, and, consequently, the least 
 figurative possible : — 
 
 Gentle death — life — glaring — silent — a person — an indi- 
 vidual — fire — the light — died away — grounds of — language 
 — freezes the blood — a man — to laugh — seen (seeing) — the 
 living — the dead — the mind — men — life — nature — to reflect 
 — element — my hands — autumn — eyesight — lived — vigor- 
 ous and brilliant — hand of — appetite — season — painfully — 
 
92 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 recollection — the soul — the world — root — hearts — vitality 
 live — die — quickened — deadened. [With repetitions of — 
 men, 6 times ; life, 6 ; mind, 5 ; and grounds, 4 times.] 
 
 The master idea principally governs any 
 peculiarities in the construction of the language 
 we are examining. We should find it less 
 apparent, therefore, in an architect's description 
 of a Cathedral, than in the narrative of the 
 same edifice from the pen of a romance writer; 
 the one limited to the technicalities of his pro- 
 fession ; the other freely ranging the fields of 
 imagination. In like manner, a writer on 
 Mythology would be drier in his language than 
 the lettered traveller describing Greece and 
 Rome. 
 
 It cannot escape notice that language in this 
 particular respect adopts objects and their known 
 qualities directly from Nature, either singly, as 
 substances, or compounded, as epithets or ad- 
 jectives. To the former would belong, for ex- 
 ample : Man, woman, child, flesh, blood, bone, 
 head, eyes, hands, feet, bowels, back, shoulders ; 
 and to the latter the states or qualities of 
 objects, as : — Birth, life, death, soul, mind, in- 
 telligence, tallness, strength, swiftness, &c, to- 
 gether with negative qualities. Corporeally, we 
 only see objects ; Mentally, we are cognizant of 
 their qualities and phenomena. Man only 
 knows himself in these two senses, and that very 
 imperfectly, seeing he is wholly ignorant of life 
 and death. 
 
 Passing from this artless, natural system of 
 phraseology, which gives clearness, force, and 
 picturesqueness to the least complex form of 
 
FIGURES OF SPEECH. 93 
 
 language, we proceed to that elaborated mode of 
 expression which requires the speaker's utmost 
 skill and polish in its construction, styled Meta- 
 phor, in the use of which there is no small 
 danger of incurring the charge of being more 
 artificial than natural ; as in the line : — 
 
 The mind the music breathing from the face ; 
 
 which Taylor, in his Essays, 1849, n °tices 
 as having no more relation to respiration than 
 the title of a certain book named Holy Breath- 
 ings. It is, however, next to impossible for an 
 exact student of Nature-Study to be guilty of 
 such far-fetched conceits. 
 
 Among all figures of speech, Metaphor stands 
 foremost. But it is not requisite in the present 
 instance to examine minutely into either the 
 construction of Metaphor, or allegory, com- 
 parison, apostrophe, antithesis, hyperbole, with 
 other forms of figurative expression. When 
 they derive their chief attributes from Nature, 
 they directly call for our attention, and we be- 
 come immediately alive to the speaker's or 
 writer's mode of treating his subject ; take, for 
 example, Lord Macaulay's description of the 
 Reformation, in the second volume of his Essays, 
 reviewing the work by Dr. Nares on Burleigh, 
 and his Times, where he says : — 
 
 That volcano has spent its rage. The lava has covered 
 with a rich incrustation the fields which it once devastated, 
 and, after having turned a beautiful and fruitful garden into 
 a desert, has again turned the desert into a still more 
 beautiful and fruitful garden. The second great eruption 
 is not yet over. The marks of its ravages are still all 
 around us. The ashes are still hot beneath our feet. In 
 some directions, the deluge of fire still continues to spread, 
 
94 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 yet experience surely entitles us to believe that this ex- 
 plosion, like that which preceded it, will fertilize the soil 
 which it h,as devastated. 
 
 Ossian's poems are much admired and fre- 
 quently quoted for just metaphors, as that on a 
 hero : — 
 
 In peace, thou art the gale of spring ; in war, the 
 mountain storm. 
 
 On a woman : — 
 
 She was covered with the light of beauty ; but her heart 
 was the house of pride. 
 
 It is not our purpose to enlarge on this subject, 
 nor to insist on any particular classification of 
 figures, or that slightly figurative phrases are not 
 truly metaphorical. It must be allowed that 
 we cannot deviate ever so slightly from the 
 strict signification of any word without pro- 
 ducing a trope. Light is of the sun, and when 
 * light ' is used in connection with ' under- 
 standing ' we admit its being metaphorically 
 correct. It is ' a simile in a word. 5 
 
 We have figures of words, and figures of 
 thoughts ; the former the common property of 
 all classes of the community, whereas the latter 
 are the special products alone of poetry and 
 eloquence. Our language is metaphorical when 
 we substitute ' sunshine' for prosperity ; 'heart' 
 for courage; ' to ruminate' for to meditate; 
 'cloud' for obscurity; 'heat' for anger; 'smiling' 
 for pleasant ; 'to vegetate' for to live ; with many 
 other expressions of a similar derivation. Or we 
 might express the same sense in another form, 
 as : In the sunshine of prosperity ; his courageous 
 
CLASSICAL ELOQUENCE. 95 
 
 heart ; ruminating ; beclouded ; hot displeasure ; 
 smiling harvest, &c. 
 
 Lord Brougham, in his Dissertation on the 
 Eloquence of the Ancients, remarks that: — 
 
 The ancients, particularly the Attic school, 
 were sparing of the more elaborate ornaments of 
 eloquence ; unless we regard as such, enumera- 
 tion, repetition, antithesis, interrogation, and the 
 other forms of condensed and vigorous expression, 
 which are not to be reckoned tropes at all. But 
 with metaphor, hyperbole, apostrophe, they cer- 
 tainly did overload their oratory. 
 
 From the Sacred Writings numerous illustra- 
 tions might be drawn. Our Lord says : — 
 
 Consider the lilies how they grow : they toil not, they 
 spin not ; and yet I say unto you, that Solomon in all his 
 glory was not arrayed like one of these. 
 
 If then God so clothe the grass, which is to-day in the 
 field, and to-morrow is cast into the oven ; how much 
 more will he clothe you, O ye of little faith ? St. Luke xii. 
 27, 28. 
 
 The present examples will suffice to illustrate 
 the use of external nature in the language of 
 prose compositions. 
 
 Not many poets are writers in prose also, nor 
 do they generally employ their pens in both 
 styles with equal success. But of all writers of 
 prose, poets are most likely to employ a style of 
 composition at once florid, figurative, and inflated ; 
 and are in continual danger of degenerating into 
 poetical prose : of all styles the most per- 
 nicious. The prose compositions of the poets 
 Scott, Byron, Southey, Coleridge, Moore, at 
 once suggest themselves to our memory and 
 admiration, for their characteristic excellences 
 
96 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 as novelists, biographers, letter writers, and 
 critics. 
 
 Various classifications might be made to include 
 the several kinds of epithets derived from natural 
 objects, their effects, and phenomena. We might, 
 for example, arrange them under several sciences 
 as follows : — 
 
 Metaphysics. — The mind's eye — mental constitution — 
 strong minded — vigorous intellect — tender hearted — 
 nervous writer — sound reasoning — stubborn will. 
 
 Optics. — Mirrored forth — magnified evil — transparent 
 trick — glassy pool — ' a green and yellow melan- 
 choly.' 
 
 Astronomy. — sunny side — moon-stricken — quite a star — 
 dark ages — a ray of light. 
 
 Meteorology. — A wind-fall — stormy passion — a cloudy 
 prospect — a misty discourse. 
 
 Natural History. — A brutal man — a savage wretch — 
 sheepish — lion-hearted — monkeyish tricks — dove- 
 like — lamb-like. 
 
 Geology. — Flinty-hearted — stone-blind, sandy foundation 
 — plastic disposition — like adamant. 
 
 Botany. — The flower of the army — seeds of promise — 
 rosy cheeks — fall of the leaf — the ' yellow and seare' 
 the pith of it — in the bud — fruits of education — root 
 and branch — engrafted — springing up — withered. 
 
 But any other arrangement would serve the 
 purpose here intended equally well, provided it 
 were more in unison with the student's own 
 feelings, or better suited to establish itself in his 
 memory. He might prefer, for instance, to asso- 
 ciate in one class all epithets appertaining to 
 human nature ; instead of arranging, according 
 to circumstances, one under Botany, and another 
 under Astronomy, or other similar divisions. 
 The more simple the classification can be made, 
 the better. 
 
 Sufficient, however, has been advanced to 
 
INFLUENCE ON LANGUAGE. 97 
 
 satisfy the reader that Nature materially assists 
 in imparting strength to the most humble as 
 well as to the loftiest language. Every writer 
 on philology notices this conspicuous fact in its 
 broad simple aspect; — that is, to the extent 
 already illustrated ; but its bearing on general 
 literature, and on poetical compositions especially, 
 has been overlooked ; its operations have never 
 been farther investigated ; and its capability of 
 learned extension does not appear to have been 
 even suspected by the most astute writers. But 
 the same process which has been so slow in its 
 progress, and so unintrusive on common observa- 
 tion, may yet prove to be capable of much greater 
 results than at present contemplated : for we can 
 but consider our work as an intermediate step 
 in an investigation promising abundant useful 
 results. 
 
 H 
 
( 98 ) 
 
 Chapter IV. 
 
 Proverbs, ancient and modern ; strictures on so-called 
 Proverbial Philosophy; Scripture proverbs; Proverbs 
 from iEschylus, Sophocles, Euripides ; Persian, Turkish, 
 and Afghan proverbs ; Shakspeare's proverbs ; Ray's 
 collection, &c; analysis showing natural objects, &c, 
 employed in the proverbs quoted. 
 
 Passing from the consideration of language 
 itself, and of its employment in oratorical and 
 written prose compositions, we proceed to offer 
 a few observations on the language of Proverbs,* 
 those household words which are common to all 
 nations ; and which derive considerable interest 
 when examined in connection with their anti- 
 quity, and their frequent approach to a rude 
 kind of poetry : especially in so far as they are 
 often alliterative, and not unfrequently highly 
 
 * Ray, in the first edition of his Collection of Proverbs, 
 offers as his opinion that a proverb is ' a short sentence 
 or phrase in common use, containing some trope, figure, 
 homonymy, rhyme, or other novelty of expression.' In the 
 second edition he notices his having admitted 'many English 
 phrases that are not properly proverbs, though that word 
 be taken in its greatest latitude.' 
 
 The editor of a fourth edition remarks : ' The dignity of 
 Proverbs is self-evident. The most learned among the 
 ancients studied and recorded them, and transmitted them 
 to their successors as the most memorable instructions of 
 human life. Plutarch, Theophrastus, Plato, and Erasmus, 
 with many others, thought the knowledge of them an 
 honourable study. Aristotle places proverbs among the 
 undeniable testimonies of truth. Quintilian, on account of 
 their veracity and success, commends them as helps to the 
 art of speaking and writing well.' 
 
PROVERBS. 99 
 
 imaginative. We find in Proverbs taken collec- 
 tively, that prolific use is made of natural objects, 
 facts, and phenomena due to an acute observance 
 of material Nature ; which in such sayings of 
 wise men of old, were employed metaphorically 
 to impress on the memory and to enforce moral 
 maxims, or some thrifty rule of conduct in every- 
 day life ; for which purpose they rarely, if ever, 
 soar above the veriest common-places of Nature. 
 
 It is to the advantage of a proverb to be 
 pointed, and therefore striking; its matter so 
 obvious as to admit of no doubt, for if disputable 
 it would no longer be a proverb, but might 
 become an excellent enigma. 
 
 It is our purpose, however, to direct attention 
 principally to the dependence of a large number 
 of proverbs on facts directly deducible from the 
 objects and appearances presented to our observa- 
 tion in the course of daily experience, requiring 
 no learned or laboured comment to render them 
 intelligible to ordinary mental capacity. 
 
 A proverb being complete in itself, it is of 
 all compositions the most concentrated and curt 
 in style ; and whole pages of proverbs would be 
 little other than maxims mostly rendered in an 
 antithetical form, a style incompatible with 
 diffuse expressions of sentiments. Taken as a 
 text any proverb would afford matter for a 
 lengthened discourse ; but while the discourse 
 might soon pass from the hearer's recollection, 
 he would find the text or proverb engraved on 
 his memory. Nay, even an epigrammatic dress 
 would have sunk into oblivion nine-tenths of our 
 proverbs had that style been adopted in their 
 
 H 2 
 L. »f C. 
 
I OO NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 composition. One line, or two at most, seems to 
 be their maximum length, assisted by c allitera- 
 tion's artful aid,' or rhyme. 
 
 The most pretentious edition of such produc- 
 tions in modern times by a single author, is the 
 Proverbial Philosophy, by Martin F. Tupper, 
 who bridges over the difficulty that would arise 
 from too great variety, by presenting his readers 
 with a number of so-called proverbs, under such 
 headings as : ' Words of Wisdom ; ' c Hidden 
 Uses ' ; ' Invention ' ; ' Authorship,' &c. Had 
 each of his proverbs been independent of such 
 an arrangement, his store would have occupied 
 a much less volume. But even with this advan- 
 tage he has had to resort to much borrowing and 
 redressing of other men's thoughts ; and where 
 he is original he is mostly extravagant and pro- 
 portionably unnatural — meaning thereby so far 
 as Nature-Study is concerned, in which light 
 alone we view his work. That he has some 
 good points his Preface will show, as in the 
 following lines : — ■ 
 
 Sweet is the virgin honey, though the wild bee have 
 
 stored it in a reed ; 
 And bright the jewelled band, that circleth an Ethiop's 
 
 arm ; 
 Pure are the grains of gold in the turbid stream of 
 
 Ganges, 
 And fair the living flowers, that spring from the dull 
 
 cold sod. 
 
 And again also under the title of Hidde?i 
 
 Uses : — 
 
 The world may laugh at famine, when forest-trees yield 
 
 bread, 
 When acorns give out fragrant drink, and the sap of the 
 
 linden is as fatness. 
 
 But the Poet studying Nature through the 
 
PROVERBIAL PHILOSOPHY. IOI 
 
 C spectacles ' of this Philosophy, would have much 
 to unlearn : than which no mental process is more 
 difficult and harassing. 
 
 The Words of Wisdom, we regret to have it 
 to say, are, in this book replete with the unna- 
 tural and artificial ; such as the following 
 conceit : — 
 
 As the beaded bubbles that sparkle in the rim of the cup 
 of immortality. 
 
 And again such gorgeous grandeur as : — 
 
 They be grains of the diamond sand, the radiant floor of 
 
 heaven, 
 Rising in sunny dust behind the chariot of God. 
 
 Among Hidden Uses, the Chemist is spoken 
 of as : — 
 
 Commanding stones that they be bread, and drawing 
 sweetness out of wormwood. 
 
 Speaking Of Invention, we are treated to 
 another chemical, or rather presumed chemical, 
 fact, thus : — 
 
 Invention is activity of mind, as fire is air in motion ; 
 With Pope in his mind, he says Of Author- 
 ship : — 
 
 it addeth immortality to dying facts that are 
 
 ready to vanish away, 
 Embalming as in amber the poor insects of an hour. 
 
 Pope wrote : — 
 
 Like flies in amber neither rich nor rare, 
 We wonder how the devil they got there. 
 
 Criticism is not our purpose beyond the range 
 of matters affecting Nature-Study ; and as poets 
 draw their information from all streams of 
 knowledge, it behoves us to point out the short- 
 comings of those who affect to teach in direct 
 
102 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 accordance with the influences of external Nature ; 
 or to present to us its noble or its minute features 
 faithfully delineated ; and when we find the 
 Harvey style of Meditations reproduced in a 
 promised proverbial form, we cannot feel other- 
 wise than offended with the substitution of tinsel 
 for precious metal, of paste for rubies, and of 
 artificial light and colouring in glorification of 
 the great universe of animate and inanimate 
 Nature. Homer gives his deities a pavement of 
 gold ; Tupper finds the floor of heaven ' radiant' 
 with c diamond sand,' all phosphorescent ; for he 
 sees it c rising in sunny dust.' Then his 
 chemistry can c command stones that they be 
 bread ' ; bread from the metallic bases of stones ! 
 Again ' fire is air in motion ' ; as every storm, 
 hurricane, cyclone does of course yearly prove ! 
 
 True proverbial philosophy is productive of 
 sayings devoid of all meretricious ornament. The 
 wise, the good and prudent teachers of mankind 
 taught the rising generation through the medium 
 of adages, which often repeated, were frequently 
 called old sayings ; only becoming trite from 
 their being too obviously true ; they were not 
 removed beyond ordinary understanding like the 
 affected imitations we have just noticed, which 
 only excite surprise from their remoteness from 
 all human sympathies, and consequently pre- 
 sumed mystery, depth, and wisdom ; there being 
 a certain enchantment even in Nature itself 
 arising from fogs and mists. 
 
 But to proceed to examples of long-approved 
 proverbs, their sterling worth, and close adherence 
 to the simple, plain, and obvious in the material 
 
ANCIENT PROVERBS. I 03 
 
 world, we quote the following, commencing with 
 the Sacred Writings, from which we select from 
 the Book of Job : — 
 
 1. (Wisdom.) It cannot be gotten for gold, neither shall 
 
 silver be weighed for the price of it. xxviii. 15. 
 
 2. For the ear trieth words, as the mouth tasteth meat. 
 
 xxxiv. 3. 
 
 From Proverbs the following : — 
 
 3. Go to the ant, thou sluggard ; consider her ways and 
 
 be wise. vi. 6. 
 
 4. Can a man take fire in his bosom, and his clothes not 
 
 be burned ? vi. 27. 
 
 5. As the whirlwind passeth, so is the wicked no more. 
 
 x. 25. 
 
 6. As vinegar to the teeth, and as smoke to the eyes, so 
 
 is the sluggard to them that send him. x. 26. 
 
 7. As a jewel of gold in a swine's snout, so is a fair 
 
 woman which is without discretion, xi. 22. 
 
 8. Look. not thou upon the wine when it is red, when it 
 
 giveth his colour in the cup, when it moveth itself 
 aright. At the last it biteth like a serpent, and 
 stingeth like an adder, xxiii. 31, 32. 
 
 9. As a roaring lion, and a raging bear ; so is a wicked 
 
 ruler over his poor people, xxviii. 15. 
 
 From Professor Thompson's Sails Attici, 
 1867, we select various maxims derived from 
 the Athenian Tragic Drama ; from iEschylus : — 
 
 10. The will of God is hard to understand. The fortunes 
 
 of men are enveloped in darkness ; but darkness to 
 Him is as the light of noonday. — The ways of His 
 thoughts are as the passages in a wood thick with 
 leaves, through the which one seeth but a little 
 way. i . 
 
 n. if it be His will that we be saved, a great root 
 
 shall spring from out a little seed. 3. 
 
 12. (Expe?ience.) There is an old Libyan fable, that an 
 eagle, struck with an arrow, saw the winged portion 
 of the shaft, and said : ' I am killed with feathers 
 from my own wing.' 65. 
 
1 04 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 13. Misery is a bird that never for two days hath his 
 feathers of one colour. 77. 
 
 14. Alter not ancient customs with meddlesome innova- 
 tion : if thou troublest clear water, thou wilt lose 
 thy drink. 114. 
 
 15. Run thou with never so nimble feet, 
 Sorrow, thou'lt find, is twice as fleet. 122. 
 
 16. {Good Temper.) A ripe mulberry is sweet; but a man 
 of gentle temper is sweeter. 129. 
 
 17. partnership in ill is as a tree 
 
 Whose Autumn fruit pays not the gathering ; 
 A good man, when he ventures forth to sea 
 With evil messmates sinks beneath one wave. 132. 
 
 18. Leave foes alone ; and give thine heart 
 To such as will like love impart : 
 
 The silly goat, so have I heard, 
 
 Once kissed the fire, and lost his beard. 154. 
 
 19. When waves of trouble come over us, we say that 
 troubles will never end ; when God sendeth a fair 
 wind, we think that the fair wind will never cease 
 a-blowing. 208. 
 
 20. mortal blessings come and go, 
 
 As flit sun-shadows athwart a wall. 62. 
 
 21. We cast in sun light shadows on the wall ; 
 And, what we cast, that only are we all. 78. 
 
 22. Man's life's a vapour, and full of woes ; 
 He cuts a caper, and down he goes. 81. 
 
 Again, from Sophocles we have : — 
 
 23. the years roll by for ever and for ever; 1. 
 
 24. [The sorrowing and miserable] it is with them 
 
 as when a storm cometh from the North, and 
 sweepeth over darken'd waters; it upheaveth the 
 sand from the depths of the sea, and the shores 
 re-echo to the lashing of the billows. 2. 
 
 25. Some will of the Sire divine 
 
 Ask rainy weather, and some sun-shine ; 
 And some will fret, if showers down tumble, 
 And if the sun shines some will grumble. 353. 
 
 26. Of Autumn fruits when gathered 
 
 Half the precious sweet is gone, 
 If upon the tree hath fed 
 
 The Wasp, Anticipation. 391. 
 
TURKISH PROVERBS. 105 
 
 And from Euripides, namely 
 
 27. God's storms uproot the stubborn oak, 
 
 But pass the bending willow by ; 
 The vale unharm'd beholds the stroke, 
 
 That blasts the mountain-peak on high. 35. 
 
 28. Behold yon high and infinite space 
 That clasps the earth in close embrace ; 
 In yon blue clear immensity, 
 
 Thy God revealed hath to thee 
 
 All of Himself thou e'er may'st see. 40. 
 
 29. High mountain peaks draw lightning down. 422. 
 29* Honey is sweet, and Love is sweet, but Vengeance 
 
 is sweeter than Love or Honey. 464. 
 
 30. one head was meant, e'er since the world began, 
 
 To fit the shoulders of a state or man ; 486. 
 
 31. Nothing is safe from peril ; nor beast, nor man, nor 
 
 state : 490. 
 
 32. Wise men, like rams, fight only with the head. 734. 
 
 33. One pair of eyes cannot see everything. 808. 
 
 Among examples of Persian Proverbs* we 
 find:— 
 
 34. One fish devours another, but the kingfisher devours 
 
 both. (As when two quarrellers are punished by 
 the magistrate.) 
 
 35. The five fingers are not all alike. 
 
 36. When an elephant sticks in the mud, it requires a 
 
 strong elephant to pull him out. 
 
 37. A bunch (of grapes) has but one stalk. {Concentrate 
 
 your labour — one purpose?) 
 
 38. The tree that has only just taken root may be pulled 
 
 up by the strength of a man. 
 
 39. When one is thirsty, a thousand pearls are not worth 
 
 one drop of water. 
 
 40. The trees that bear fruit bear a burden as well. 
 
 From a small collection of Turkish Proverbs, 
 translated into English, i2mo. Venice, i860, 
 we select : — 
 
 41. Every thing which comes from heaven, the earth 
 
 receives it. 
 
 * From a collection by Thos. Roebuck, 8vo. Calcutta, 1824. 
 
1 06 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 42. The bird feels not its wing heavy, 
 
 43. Whether sugar be white or black, it preserves its 
 
 proper taste. 
 
 44. It matters less to a man where he is born than 
 
 where he can live. 
 
 45. Every flower has its perfume. 
 
 46. Two hands are for the defence of one head. 
 
 47. Although the fly be small among insects, yet it has 
 
 power to turn the stomach of man. 
 
 48. There are not sweet onions, nor white figs. 
 
 Among other specimens of Raverty's Afghan 
 poetry, 8vo., 1862, are the following : — 
 
 49. A spoiled son taketh not to discipline and instruction ; 
 And a shaded palm-tree yieldeth not ripe dates. 
 
 50. Certainly, the ass and mule are in their place in the 
 stable ; but not a blockhead, without application, in 
 the house. 
 
 Shakspeare's dramas afford many proverbial 
 sayings ; from King Richard II. we take : — 
 
 51. (Bolingbroke to the King) — this must my comfort be, 
 That sun that warms you here shall shine on me. 
 
 52. (Bolingbroke referring to the Dtike of Norfolk) 
 
 the more fair and crystal is the sky, 
 
 The uglier seem the clouds that in it fly. 
 
 In Troihis and Cressida^ Pandurus says : — 
 
 53. He that will have a cake out of the wheat, must 
 needs tarry the grinding. 
 
 And in As you like it occurs : — 
 
 54. Beauty provoketh thieves sooner than gold. 
 
 The only remaining proverbs we shall offer 
 from the same source are selected from Mrs. 
 Mary C. Clarke's collection of them, in a small 
 volume published in 1858, as follows : — 
 
 55. He that stands upon a slippery place 
 Makes nice of no vile hold to stay him up. 
 
 56. How hard it is to hide the sparks of nature ! 
 
SHAKSPERIAN PROVERBS. 107 
 
 57. Is the jay more precious than the lark, 
 Because his feathers are more beautiful ? 
 Or is the adder better than the eel, 
 Because his painted skin contents the eye ? 
 
 58. Idle weeds are fast in growth. 
 
 59. One touch of nature makes the whole world kin. 
 
 60. Our very eyes are sometimes like our judgments, 
 
 blind. 
 
 61. Sowed cockle reaped no corn. 
 
 62. Small showers last long, but sudden storms are 
 
 short. 
 
 63. Sorrow breaks seasons and reposing hours, 
 Makes the night morning and the noon-tide night. 
 
 64. Smooth runs the water when the brook is deep. 
 
 65. Sweet flowers are slow, and weeds make haste. 
 
 66. Sorrow concealed, like an oven stopp'd, 
 Doth burn the heart to cinders where it is. 
 
 67. The most forward bud 
 
 Is eaten by the canker ere it blow. 
 
 68. The current, that with gentle murmur glides, 
 Thou know'st, being stopp'd, impatiently doth rage. 
 
 69. The strongest oaths are straw 
 To the lire i' the blood. 
 
 70. To die, is to be banished from myself. 
 
 71. This weak impress of love is as a figure 
 
 Trench'd in ice ; which, with an hour's heat, 
 Dissolves to water, and doth lose his form. 
 
 72. The quality of mercy is not strained, 
 
 It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven 
 Upon the place beneath. 
 
 73. Tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, 
 
 Sermons in stones, and good in every thing. 
 
 74. The hind that would be mated by the lion must die 
 
 for love. 
 
 75. The smallest worm will turn, being trodden on ; 
 And doves will peck in safeguard of their brood. 
 
 76. There is a tide in the affairs of men, 
 
 Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune ; 
 Omitted, all the voyage of their life 
 Is bound in shallows and in miseries. 
 
 77. There are more things in heaven and earth 
 Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. 
 
 78. What's in a name ? that which we call a rose 
 
 By any other name would smell as sweet. 
 
I08 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 78*. How full of briars is this working-day world ! 
 
 79. Glory is like a circle in the water, 
 Which never ceaseth to enlarge itself, 
 
 Till, by broad spreading, it disperse to nought. 
 
 80. Fruits that blossom first will first be ripe. 
 
 81. Every cloud engenders not a storm. 
 
 82. Dark night, that from the eye his function takes, 
 The ear more quick of apprehension makes. 
 
 83. Drones suck not eagles' blood, but rob bee-hives. 
 
 84. Checks and disasters 
 
 Grow in the veins of actions highest rear'd ; 
 As knots, by the conflux of meeting sap, 
 Infect the sound pine, and divert his grain 
 Tortive and errant from his course of growth. 
 
 85. Be thou as chaste as ice, as pure as snow, thou shalt 
 
 not escape calumny. 
 
 In Maunder's 'Treasury of Knowledge, or 
 Dictionary, among many others, occur the fol- 
 lowing proverbs : — 
 
 86. A good maxim is never out of season. 
 
 87. A bitter jest is the poison of friendship. 
 
 88. A truly great man borrows no lustre from splendid 
 
 ancestry. 
 
 89. A desire for admiration is the offspring of vanity. 
 
 90. A wounded reputation is seldom cured. 
 
 91. Affliction is the wholesome soil of virtue. 
 
 92. A good cause makes a stout heart and a strong arm. 
 
 93. A blithe heart makes a blooming visage. 
 
 94. As a bird is known by his note, so is a man by his 
 
 discourse. 
 
 95. Avoid a slanderer as you would a scorpion. 
 
 96. Beware of the geese when the fox preaches. 
 
 97. Beauty is the flower, but virtue is the fruit of life. 
 
 98. Common sense is the growth of all countries. 
 
 99. Contentment is to the mind as light to the eye. 
 
 100. Catch not at the shadow, and lose the substance. 
 
 101. Courage ought to have eyes as well as arms. 
 
 102. Cloudy mornings often bring clear evenings. 
 
 103. Death is deaf, and hears no denial. 
 
 104. Defer not till the evening what the morning may 
 
 accomplish. 
 
RAY'S PROVERBS. I 09 
 
 105. Deeds are fruits ; words but leaves. 
 
 106. Danger always attends at the heels of pride and 
 
 ambition. 
 
 107. Experience is the mother of science. 
 
 108. Excess and envy waste the flesh and the spirit, 
 iog. Every light has its shadow. 
 
 no. Give your tongue more holiday than your hands or 
 eyes. 
 
 In conclusion we shall give a selection from 
 Mr. Bonn's ample Hand-Book of Proverbs, 
 based on Ray's Collections, i2mo., 1845, 
 namely : — 
 
 in. No one knows the weight of another's burden. 
 
 112. Beauty is a blossom. 
 
 113. Beauty draws more than oxen. 
 
 114. Beauty is no inheritance. 
 
 115. That which blossoms in the spring, will bring forth 
 
 fruit in the autumn ; 
 
 116. He that blows in the dust, fills his own eyes. 
 
 117. Though the fox runs, the chicken hath wings. 
 
 118. After clouds comes clear weather. 
 
 119. Crooked logs make straight fires. 
 
 120. Every day has its night, every weal its woe. Danish. 
 
 121. Eat to live, but do not live to eat. 
 
 122. No man can flay a stone. 
 
 123. One flower makes no garland. 
 
 124. When the fox is asleep nothing falls into his mouth. 
 
 Fr. 
 
 125. A tree is known by its fruit, and not by its leaves. 
 
 126. The further we go the further behind. 
 
 127. What your glass tells you will not be told by counsel. 
 
 128. One is not so soon healed as hurt. 
 
 129. Every man is best known to himself. 
 
 130. Honey is sweet, but the bee stings. Ital. 
 
 131. Little sticks kindle the fire, but great ones put it out. 
 
 132. The morning sun never lasts a day. 
 
 133. Music helps not the tooth-ache. 
 
 134. Nature draws more than ten oxen. 
 
 135. The nightingale and the cuckoo sing both in one 
 
 month. 
 
I [O NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 136. Remove an old tree, and it will wither to death. 
 
 137. A rugged stone grows smooth from hand to hand. 
 
 138. Whether you boil snow or pound it, you will have 
 
 but water from it. 
 
 139. Who remove stones, bruise their fingers. 
 
 140. In every country the sun riseth in the morning. 
 
 141. A thin meadow is soon mowed. 
 
 142. The tide will fetch away what the ebb brings. 
 
 143. Time is the rider that breaks youth. 
 
 144. When the tree is fallen, every one goes to it with his 
 
 hatchet. Fr. 
 
 145. As welcome as flowers in May. 
 
 146. Willows are weak, yet they bind other wood. Hal. 
 
 147. Wolves lose their teeth, but not their memory. 
 
 148. Green wood makes a hot fire. 
 
 149. Better give the wool than the sheep. 
 
 150. Good words without deeds are rushes and reeds. 
 
 151. Years know more than books. 
 
 Proverbs that are entire sentences. 
 
 152. A black plum is as sweet as a white. 
 
 153. A black hen lays a white egg. 
 
 A Proverbial rhyme. 
 
 154. Snow is white and lies in the dike, 
 
 And every many lets it lie ; 
 Pepper is black and hath a good smack, 
 And every man doth it buy. 
 
 A Hebrew Proverb. 
 
 155. A myrtle standing among nettles, does notwith- 
 
 standing retain the name of a myrtle. 
 
 We shall now proceed to analyze the language 
 of these proverbs in the same manner as that 
 already adopted when examining prose compo- 
 sitions, for the amount of the indebtedness of 
 such proverbial maxims to the external world. 
 And commencing with Animal Creation, we find 
 as follows : — 
 
ANALYSIS OF PROVERBS. I I I 
 
 i, Human Nature. — Man, men, mother, son, youth, age, 
 offspring; — head, visage, mouth, teeth, tongue, 
 eating, sleep, ears, eyes, blind ; — shoulders, arms, 
 hands, fingers, feet, heels : — heart, flesh, blood, 
 veins, skin, life, growth, death ; — nature, beauty, 
 strength, hurt, wound, healed, cured; — mind, me- 
 mory, words, love, vengeance, sorrow, mercy, 
 misery, glory, calumny, chaste. 
 
 2. Animal, &c. — i. Elephant, lion, bear, ass, mule, 
 rams, goat, sheep, swine, pigs, oxen, hind, fox, 
 wolves; — beast, wool. 2. Fish. 3. Eagle, king- 
 fisher, cuckoo, nightingale, hen, chicken, geese, 
 dove ; — bird, wings, Qgg. 4. Serpent, adder, eel, 
 worm, scorpion, ant, wasp, fly, canker, bee, drones; — 
 sting, honey. 
 
 2. Vegetable, &>c. — Oak, palm-tree, pine, mulberry, myr- 
 
 tle, briars, willows ; — tree, wood, logs, root, knots, 
 sap ; — seed, fruit, plum, dates, grapes, flower, 
 blossom, perfume, bud, ripe, bitter, poison, leaves : — 
 wheat, corn, cockle, straw, rose, pepper, onion, 
 rushes, reeds, nettles, weeds ; — wine, sugar, cake. 
 
 3. Mineral, &*c. — 1. Gold, silver, earth, mountain, vale, 
 
 meadow, soil, stones, dust ; — substance, weight ; — 
 2. Sea, waves, billows, tide, current, flood, brook, 
 shallows ; — 3. Rain, showers : — ice, snow. 
 
 4. Astronomical, meteorological, &c. — Sun, lustre, light, 
 
 heaven, sky, space, clouds, vapour, lightning; — 
 seasons, autumn, day, noon, night, evening, dark- 
 ness, years; — music, singing, echo; — fire, smoke, 
 shadows, lightning, storm, wind, whirlwind, slip- 
 pery, spirit. 
 
 After we have duly examined poetical com- 
 positions in the same manner as the foregoing 
 analysis exhibits, we shall then be better prepared 
 than at present to show the advantages of this 
 mode of tracing the influences of external nature 
 to their true sources, and their consequent ope- 
 rations on our mental faculties. 
 
I I 2 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Chapter V. 
 
 Descriptive poetry in its first division, as applied to single 
 objects and features ; mere naming or cataloguing cen- 
 sured ; attempt to portray Nature through Art ; design of 
 the examples of poetical practice in description ; Celes- 
 tial and Terrestrial Nature illustrated by poetical selec- 
 tions. 
 
 In so far as the realm of Nature is concerned, 
 that class of poetry termed Descriptive has been 
 more extensively, and more successfully cultivated 
 than any other. Not only do we find delinea- 
 tions of natural objects and scenery in many 
 distinct passages, — they are likewise interwoven 
 into all other classes of poetical composition. 
 Heaven and earth are ransacked for the tangible 
 or the immaterial, or both ; here the sun, moon, 
 light, and shade ; there blossoms, flowers, and 
 fruits, with endless sketches of the varied pro- 
 ducts, phases, and phenomena of the natural 
 world. 
 
 For convenience we shall consider that part of 
 our theme now under review, under two heads, 
 ist, Simple description; 2nd, Compound descrip- 
 tion : the first presenting, as it were, the poet's 
 sketch-book of isolated natural objects or facts ; 
 the other furnishing more general views of the 
 external world, constituting a comprehensive 
 picture of external Nature. 
 
THE DRY STYLE. 
 
 "3 
 
 As noticed in Chapter I., the early Italian 
 poets employed only very general imagery ; as, 
 sun, moon, flowers, &c, a mere cataloguing 
 of objects, a method common in the practice of 
 most of the ancient as well as many modern poets. 
 In the poem of Universal Beauty^ by Henry 
 Brooke, a folio published in 1735, we find the 
 frequent recurrence of such lines as : — 
 
 Delicious regions S plants, woods, waters, glades, 
 Grottos, arbours, flow'rets, downs 4 and rural shades, 
 The brooks, that sportive wind the echoing hills, 
 The pearly founts, smooth lakes, and murmuring rills. 
 
 This cold, dry style excited Wordsworth's 
 severest censures ; he found it in Dryden's 
 effusions, and condemned it alike in that great 
 writer, and in all poets of the same school. Yet 
 even this unimpassioned strain is not, perhaps, so 
 hostile to improvement as the tendency to look 
 from Art up to Nature. Drayton describes : — 
 
 Those cliffs whose craggy sides are clad 
 With trees of sundry suits, 
 
 And fruit-trees which were : — 
 
 Like gorgeous hangings on the wall 
 Of some rich princely room. 
 
 All very much after the fashion of dramatic 
 haberdashery. 
 
 Pope, notwithstanding the many traits of 
 excellence that distinguish his poems, has fre- 
 quently been charged with a tendency to be 
 artificial when it was undoubtedly his intention 
 to be strictly natural. Moir has truthfully enough 
 expressed his opinion that : ' From the windows 
 of the house we have a glimpse of Nature 
 indeed ; but it consists of shaven lawns and 
 
 1 
 
114 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 clipped hedges, and diamonded parterres, beyond 
 which are parks ' remarkable only for c tame 
 deer, artificial cascades, and Chinese bridges.' 
 The following lines from Windsor Forest 
 have all the flatness, stiffness, and artificiality of 
 dramatic scenery: — 
 
 Thy forest, Windsor, and thy green retreats, 
 
 * * * * * 
 
 Here hills and vales, the woodland and the plain, 
 Here earth and water seem to strive again ; 
 Not chaos-like, together crush'd and bruised, 
 But, as the world, harmoniously confused ; 
 Where order in variety we see, 
 And where, though all things differ, all agree. 
 Here waving groves a chequer'd scene display, 
 
 * * * * *■ 
 
 There, interspersed in lawns and opening glades, 
 Thin trees arise that shun each other's shades. 
 Here in full light the russet plains extend ; 
 There, wrapt in clouds, the bluish hills ascend. 
 
 And midst the desert fruitful fields arise, 
 
 That crown'd with tufted trees and springing corn, 
 
 Like verdant isles the sable waste adorn. 
 
 Here blushing Flora paints the enamelled ground, 
 Here Ceres' gifts in waving prospect stand, 
 
 When frosts have whitened all the naked groves ; 
 Where doves in flocks the leafless trees o'ershade, 
 And lonely woodcocks haunt the watery glade. 
 
 With reference to the extracts given in the 
 present and succeeding chapters, it may be as 
 well to observe generally here that, numerous as 
 the illustrations must appear on a first examina- 
 tion, they will not be found excessive when the 
 number of authors, and the variety offered by 
 the subject itself is borne in mind. Besides, the 
 very novelty of the subject renders it the more 
 necessary in this first laying down of a new 
 
POETICAL TREATMENT. I I 5 
 
 system, to bring forward even to overflowing, 
 such evidence as may best serve to demonstrate 
 its truthfulness. Every poet has his own par- 
 ticular mode of treatment, just as Darwin was 
 unlike Shakspeare, and Thomson unlike Darwin. 
 A system deduced from limited evidence might 
 be expected to be overthrown, were examination 
 pushed a little farther. Again, an author may 
 easily make straggling evidence bend to uphold 
 an unsound theory ; but in a mass of evidence 
 as ' in a multitude of counsellors ' there is safety. 
 We may farther urge, that in order to obtain a 
 fair view of the poetical descriptions of Nature, 
 we must quote the poet's utterances, with respect 
 not only to the firmament, but also to the 
 universe at large, and all its constituent portions ; 
 inasmuch as — 
 
 The poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling, 
 
 Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven ; 
 
 And, as imagination bodies forth 
 
 The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen 
 
 Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing 
 
 A local habitation, and a name. 
 
 The poet's powers, however, may be considered 
 as commencing with visible forms : and with 
 such Nature- Study must also commence. For 
 that purpose the following selection is presented, 
 to show modes of treatment, and not simply as 
 ' elegant extracts.' Many of the verses would but 
 indifferently serve the latter purpose, while for the 
 object intended they are appropriate, representing 
 as they do a class of poets, and not a selection 
 of subjects. For instance, in reading the w T orks 
 of Shakspeare or Milton, of Thomson or 
 Wordsworth, we may take opposite passages as 
 
 1 2 
 
I 1 6 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 we meet with them, albeit livelier or better 
 descriptions of the particular objects noted might 
 be met with elsewhere. Our object is not to 
 discover which poet best describes the sun, the 
 moon, or other special objects in creation. It 
 suffices that some poet of eminence has touched 
 on the selected subject, and the reader must judge 
 of the poet's rendering of the matter. That 
 which Dr. Johnson performed in illustrating 
 our language, we would humbly endeavour to 
 accomplish in our exhibition of the word- 
 painting of the poets as applied to Nature. 
 
 The selections that follow may, for facility 
 of reference, be arranged under two divisions — 
 ist, Celestial; the heavens and all belonging 
 thereto ; 2nd, Terrestrial ; the earth, and all 
 mundane things. 
 
 Celestial. 
 
 Sun, &c. — 
 
 1. But when the sun was set, and shades of night 
 O'erspread the sky, 
 
 * * * * 
 
 And when the rosy-fingered morn appeared. b. i. 
 
 2. Now morn in saffron-robe the earth o'erspread. 
 
 b. viii. 
 
 3. Now morn in saffron robe, from the ocean stream 
 Ascending, light diffused o'er Gods and men. b. xix. 
 
 4. And so the sun and moon seem fixt above, 
 Yet sure experience tells us they must move. 
 
 5. The sun from sea to sailors seems to rise 
 And set, for they see only seas and skies. 
 
 6. As when the sun begins his early race, 
 
 And views the joyful earth with blushing face, 
 
 No. 1, 2, 3. Lord Derby's Homer's Iliad, 1867. 4, 5, 6. 
 Creech's Lucretius, b. iv. v. 
 
SUN. ETC. 
 
 II 7 
 
 And quaffs the pearly dew spread o'er the grass, 
 From earth he draws some mists with busy beams, 
 From wandring waters some, and running streams : 
 These thin, these subtle mists, when rais'd on high, 
 And join'd above, spread clouds o'er all the sky : 
 
 7. Now had the sun to that horizon reach'd, 
 That covers, with the most exalted point 
 Of its meridian circle, Salem's walls, 
 And night, that opposite to him her orb 
 Rounds, from the stream of Ganges issued forth, 
 Holding the scales, that from her hands are dropp'd 
 When she reigns highest : so that where I was, 
 Aurora's white and vermeil-tinctur'd cheek 
 
 To orange turn'd as she in age increas'd. 
 
 8. Rise betimes, while th' opal-colour'd morn 
 In golden pomp doth May-day's doors adorn. 
 
 9. O'er the wide earth yon torch of heavenly light 
 Its splendour spreads, 
 
 * * * * 
 
 O, if a mortal's power could stretch so high, 
 
 * ^ * 
 
 There waves of fire 'gainst waves of fire are dashing, 
 And know no bounds ; there hurricanes of flame, 
 As if in everlasting combat flashing, 
 Roar with a fury which no time can tame : 
 There molten mountains boil like ocean -waves, 
 And rain in burning streams the welkin laves. 
 
 10. But rays of light, 
 Now suddenly, diverging from the orb, 
 Retired behind the mountain tops, or, veiled 
 By the dense air, shot upwards to the crown 
 Of the blue firmament — aloft — and wide : 
 And multitudes of little floating clouds, 
 
 Ere we, who saw, of change were conscious, pierced 
 Through their etherial texture, had become 
 Vivid as fire, — clouds separately poised, 
 Innumerable multitude of forms 
 Scattered through half the circle of the sky ; 
 And giving back, and shedding each on each, 
 With prodigal communion, the bright hues 
 Which from the unapparent fount of glory 
 
 7. Cary's Dante (Purgatory), c. ii. 8. Sylvester's Du 
 Bartas. 9. Bowring's Russian Poets. (Lomonossov), 1821. 
 10. Wordsworth, The Excursion. 
 
i8 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 They had imbibed, and ceased not to receive. 
 That which the heavens displayed the liquid deep 
 Repeated, but with unity sublime. 
 
 ii. At the root 
 
 Of that tall pine, the shadow of whose bare 
 And slender stem, while here I sit at eve, 
 Oft stretches tow'rds me, like a long straight path, 
 Traced faintly on the greensward. 
 
 Morning. — 
 
 i. The hour was morning's prime, and on his way 
 Aloft the sun ascended with those stars, 
 That with him rose, when Love divine first mov'd 
 Those its fair works : — c. i. 
 
 2. In the year's early nonage, when the sun 
 Tempers his tresses in Aquarius' urn, 
 
 And now towards equal day the nights recede, 
 
 Whenas the rime upon the earth puts on 
 
 Her dazzling sister's image, but not long 
 
 Her milder sway endures, then riseth up 
 
 The village hind, — c. xxiv. 
 
 3. Now the golden morn aloft 
 
 Waves her dew-bespangled wing, 
 With vermeil cheek, and whisper soft 
 She woos the tardy spring : 
 
 4. Now the bright morning star, day's harbinger, 
 Comes dancing from the east, and leads with her 
 The flowery May, who from her green lap throws 
 The yellow cowslip, and the pale primrose. 
 
 Hail, bounteous May, that dost inspire 
 
 Mirth and youth and warm desire ; 
 
 Woods and groves are of thy dressing, 
 
 Hill and dale doth boast thy blessing. 
 Thus we salute thee with our early song, 
 And welcome thee, and wish thee long. 
 
 Evening. — 
 
 5. Call to remembrance, reader, if thou e'er 
 Hast, on a mountain top, been ta'en by cloud, 
 Through which thou saw'st no better than the mole 
 Doth through opacous membrane ; then, whene'er 
 The wat'ry vapours dense began to melt 
 
 Into thin air, how faintly the sun's sphere 
 
 11. The Excursion , b. vi. 1, 2. Gary's Dante {Hell.) 
 3. Gray's Ode, Vicissitude. 4. Milton's May Morning. 
 5. Cary's Dante (Purgatory.) 
 
NIGHT. 
 
 II 9 
 
 Seem'd wading through them ; so thy nimble thought 
 May image, how at first I re-beheld 
 The sun, that bedward now his couch o'erhung. 
 
 c. xvii. 
 Night. — 
 
 6. The moon well-nigh 
 
 To midnight hour belated, made the stars 
 Appear to wink and fade ; and her broad disk 
 Seem'd like a crag on fire, as up the vault 
 
 That course she journey'd, which the sun then warms, 
 When they of Rome behold him at his set. 
 
 7. It was an hour, when he who climbs, had need 
 To walk uncrippled : for the sun had now 
 
 To Taurus the meridian circle left, 
 And to the Scorpion left the night. As one 
 That makes no pause, but presses on his road, 
 Whate'er betide him, if some urgent need 
 Impel : so enter'd we upon our way. 
 
 8. All night they [the Trojans] camped; and frequent 
 
 blazed their fires. 
 As when in Heaven, around the glittering moon 
 The stars shine bright amid the breathless air ; 
 And every crag, and every jutting peak 630 
 
 Stands boldly forth, and every forest glade ; 
 Even to the gates of Heaven is opened wide 
 The boundless sky; shines each particular star 
 Distinct ; joy fills the gazing shepherd's heart. 
 So bright, so thickly scattered o'er the plain, 635 
 
 Before the walls of Troy, between the ships 
 And Xanthus' stream, the Trojan watch-fires blazed. 
 
 9. And shadows seem to move, to turn, and stay 
 As bodies do, and servilely obey : 
 
 * * * * * 
 
 (For shadow is no more, a sudden night,) 
 
 * . * * * * 
 
 And rays as soon come on, and chace the night : 
 The Negro-darkness washt becomes a white. 
 
 10. In such a night, when every louder wind 
 Is to its distant cavern safe confined ; 
 And only gentle Zephyr fans his wings, 
 
 6, 7. Gary's Dante {Purgatory), c. xviii. xxiv. 8. Lord 
 Derby's Homer's Iliad, b. viii. 9. Creech's Lucretius. 
 10. Countess of Winchelsea's Nocturnal Reverie. 
 
120 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 And lonely Philomel still waking sings ; 
 
 Or from some tree, famed for the owl's delight, 
 
 She, hollowing clear, directs the wanderer right : 
 
 In such a night, when passing clouds give place, 
 
 Or thinly veil the heaven's mysterious face ; 
 
 When in some river, overhung with green, 
 
 The waning moon and trembling leaves are seen ; 
 
 When freshen'd grass now bears itself upright, 
 
 And makes cool banks to pleasing rest invite, 
 
 Whence springs the woodbine, and the bramble-rose, 
 
 And where the sleepy cowslip shelter'd grows ; 
 
 Whilst now a paler hue the foxglove takes, 
 
 Yet chequers still with red the dusky brakes ; 
 
 When scatter'd glow-worms, but in twilight fine, 
 
 Show trivial beauties watch their hour to shine ; 
 
 Whilst Salisb'ry stands the test of every light, 
 
 In perfect charms and perfect virtue bright : 
 
 When odours which declined repelling day, 
 
 Through temperate air uninterrupted stray ; 
 
 When darken'd groves their softest shadows wear, 
 
 And falling waters we distinctly hear; 
 
 When through the gloom more venerable shows 
 
 Some ancient fabric, awful in repose ; 
 
 While sun-burnt hills their swarthy looks conceal, 
 
 And swelling haycocks thicken up the vale : 
 
 When the loosed horse now, as his pasture leads, 
 
 Comes slowly grazing through th' adjoining meads, 
 
 Whose stealing pace and lengthen'd shade we fear, 
 
 Till torn-up forage in his teeth we hear ; 
 
 When nibbling sheep at large pursue their food, 
 
 And unmolested kine rechew the cud ; 
 
 When curlews cry beneath the village-walls, 
 
 And to her straggling brood the partridge calls ; 
 
 Their short-lived jubilee the creatures keep, 
 
 Which but endures whilst tyrant man doth sleep ; 
 
 When a sedate content the spirit feels, 
 
 And no fierce light disturbs, whilst it reveals ; 
 
 But silent musings urge the mind to seek 
 
 Something too high for syllables to speak ; 
 
 Till the free soul to a composedness charm'd, 
 
 Finding the elements of rage disarm'd, 
 
 O'er all below a solemn quiet grown, 
 
 Joys in the inferior world and think it like her own : 
 
 In such a night let me abroad remain, 
 
 Till morning breaks, and all's confused again ; 
 
 Our cares, our toils, our clamours are renew'd, 
 
 Or pleasures, seldom reach'd, again pursued. 
 
NIGHT. I 2 I 
 
 Night. — 
 
 i. Night, sable goddess ! from her ebon throne, 
 
 In rayless majesty, now stretches forth 
 Her leaden sceptre o'er a slumbering world. 
 
 2. Heaven's ebon vault, 
 
 Studded with stars, unutterably bright, 
 
 Through which the moon's unclouded grandeur rolls, 
 
 Seems like a canopy which love had spread 
 
 To curtain her sleeping world. Yon gentle hills, 
 
 Robed in a garment of untrodden snow ; 
 
 Yon darksome rocks, whence icicles depend, 
 
 So stainless, that their white and glittering spires 
 
 Tinge not the moon's pure beam ; * * 
 
 all form a scene 
 
 Where musing solitude might love to lift 
 Her soul above the sphere of earthliness ; 
 Where silence undisturbed might watch alone, 
 So cold, so bright, so still. 
 
 3. The night was fair, and countless stars 
 Studded heaven's dark blue vault, — 
 
 Just o'er the eastern wave 
 Peeped the first faint smiles of morn : — 
 
 4. The moon among the clouds rose high, 
 And all the city hum was by. 
 
 Upon the street, where late before 
 Did din of war and warriors roar, 
 
 You might have heard a pebble fall, 
 A beetle hum, a cricket sing, 
 An owlet flap his boding wing 
 
 On Giles's steeple tall. 
 
 5. It was a night of lovely June, 
 
 High rode in cloudless blue the moon, 
 
 Demayet smiled beneath her ray ; 
 Old Stirling's towers arose in light, 
 And, twined in links of silver bright. 
 
 Her winding river lay. 
 Ah ! gentle planet ! other sight 
 Shall greet thee next returning night, 
 Of broken arms and banners tore, 
 And marshes dark with human gore, 
 
 1. Young's Night Thoughts. 2, 3. Shelley's Queen Mab. 
 4. Scott's Marmion, c. v. 5. Scott's Lord of the Isles, 
 c. vi. 
 
I 2 2 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 And piles of slaughtered men and horse, 
 And Forth that floats the frequent corse, 
 And many a wounded wretch to plain 
 Beneath thy silver light in vain ! 
 Spring. — 
 
 i. Blind, wretched man ! in what dark paths of strife 
 
 We walk this little journey of our life ! 
 
 * * . * * * 
 
 Yet underneath a loving myrtle's shade, 
 Just by a purling" stream supinely laid, 
 When spring with gaudy flowers the earth had spread, 
 And sweetest roses grow around our head, 
 Envied by wealth and power, with small expense 
 We may enjoy the sweet delights of sense, b. ii. 
 
 2. The soote season, that bud and bloome forth brings, 
 With green hath clad the hill and eke the vale. 
 The nightingale with feathers new she sings ; 
 
 The turtle to her mate hath told her tale. 
 
 Summer is come, for every spray now springs. 
 
 The hart hath hung his old head on the pale ; 
 
 The buck in brake his winter coat he flings ; 
 
 The fishes fleet with new repaired scale ; 
 
 The adder all her slough away she flings ; 
 
 The swift swallow pursueth the flies small; 
 
 The busy bee her honey now she mingles ; 
 
 Winter is worn that was the flower's bale. 
 And thus I see among these pleasant things 
 Each care decays, and yet my sorrow springs. 
 
 3. When daisies pied, and violets blue, 
 
 And lady-smocks all silver-white, 
 And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue, 
 
 Do paint the meadows with delight. 
 
 4. In April's gilded morn when south winds blow, 
 And gently shake the hawthorn's silver crown, 
 Wafting its scent the forest glade adown, 
 
 The dewy shelter of the bounding doe, 
 Then, under trees, soft tufts of primrose show 
 Their paley-yellowing flower ; to the moist sun 
 Blue harebells peep, while cowslips stand unblown, 
 Plighted to riper May ; and lavish flow, 
 The lark's loud carols in the wilds of air. 
 O ! not to Nature's glad enthusiast cling 
 
 1. Creech's Lucretius. 2. Henry Howard, Earl of 
 Surrey. 3. Love's Labour Lost, act v. sc. 2. 4. Anna 
 Seward. 
 
SPRING, ETC. I23 
 
 Avarice and pride. Through her now blooming 
 
 sphere 
 Charmed as he roves, his thoughts enraptured spring 
 To Him, who gives frail man's appointed time 
 These cheering hours of promise and of prime. 
 
 5. Come May, with all thy flowers, 
 
 Thy sweetly scented thorn, 
 Thy cooling ev'ning showers, 
 
 Thy fragrant breath at morn. 
 When May-flies haunt the willow, 
 
 When May-buds tempt the bee, 
 Then o'er the shining billow 
 
 My love will come to me. 
 
 6. In the sweet spring-days, 
 
 With whitening hedges, and uncrumpling fern, 
 
 And blue-bells trembling by the forest-ways, 
 And scent of hay new-mown. 
 
 Summer. — 
 
 1. In summer when the shawes be shene, 
 
 And leaves be large and long, 
 It is fully merry in fair forest 
 
 To hear the fowle's song ; 
 To see the deer draw to the dale, 
 
 And leave the hilles hee, [high] 
 And shadow them in the leves green, 
 
 Under the greenwood tree. 
 
 2. In summer, when the leaves spring, 
 
 The blossoms on every bough, 
 So merry do the birdes sing, 
 In woodys merry now. 
 
 3. The gentle zephyrs are blowing, 
 
 The graceful willows tremble, 
 The rivulets all are flowing, 
 
 The birds to their songs assemble. 
 The torrents of the mountain 
 
 Glide gently through the vale, 
 And the music of the fountain 
 
 Makes a concert with the gale. 
 The bees have left their dwelling, 
 
 To gather their honied stores ; 
 List to their anthems swelling, 
 
 Around the bending flowers ! 
 
 5. Moore's Irish Melodies. 6. M. Arnold's Poem, 
 Thyrsis. 1,2. Bell's Early Ballads. 3. Bowring's Poetry, 
 &c. of Spain. 
 
1 24 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 The early sobbing of the morn, 
 * * * 
 
 there crept 
 
 A little noiseless noise among the leaves, 
 Born of the very sigh that silence heaves ; 
 For not the faintest motion could be seen 
 Of all the shades that slanted o'er the green. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 A filbert-hedge with wild-briar overtwined, 
 And clumps of woodbine taking the soft wind 
 Upon their summer thrones : — 
 
 5. 'Twas summer, and the sun had mounted high ; 
 Southward the landscape indistinctly glared 
 Through a pale steam ; but all the northern downs, 
 In clearest air ascending, showed far off 
 
 A surface dappled o'er with shadows flung 
 From many a brooding cloud, far as the sight 
 Could reach, those many shadows lay in spots 
 Determined and unmoved, with steady beams 
 Of bright and pleasant sunshine interposed; b. i. 
 
 6. Full Nature swarms with life ; one wondrous mass 
 Of animals, or atoms organised. 
 
 7. Welcome, ye shades ! ye bowery thickets, hail ! 
 Ye lofty pines ! ye venerable oaks ! 
 
 Ye ashes wild, resounding o'er the steep ! 
 Delicious is your shelter to the soul, * * * 
 
 the midnight depth 
 
 Of yonder grove, of wildest, largest growth. 
 
 8. Bear me, Pomona, to thy citron groves ; 
 To where the lemon and the piercing lime, 
 
 With the deep orange, glowing through the green, 
 Their lighter glories blend. 
 
 9. But see the tall elm shadows reach 
 
 Athwart the field, the rooks fly home, 
 The light streams gorgeous up the o'erarching beech ; 
 
 With the calm hour, soft weary fancies come. 
 In heaven the low red harvest moon, 
 
 The glowworm on the dewy ground, 
 Will light us home, with our glad burden song ; 
 
 Grave be our evening prayers, our slumbers sound. 
 
 4. Keats' Poems. 5. The Excursion. 6, 7, 8. Thomson's 
 Seasons, 9. Keble's Lyra Innocentium. 
 
AUTUMN. 1 25 
 
 Autumn. — 
 
 1. Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness ! 
 
 Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun ; 
 Conspiring with him how to load and bless 
 
 With fruit the vines that round the thatch eaves run ; 
 To bend with apples the mossed cottage trees, 
 
 And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core ; 
 To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells 
 
 With a sweet kernel ; to set budding more, 
 And still more, later flowers for the bees, 
 Until they think warm days will never cease, 
 
 For Summer has o'erbrimmed their clammy cells. 
 
 # * * # 
 
 While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day, 
 And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue ; 
 
 Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn 
 Among the river sallows, borne aloft 
 
 Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies ; 
 
 And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn ; 
 Hedge-crickets sing ; and now with treble soft 
 The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft, 
 
 And gathering swallows twitter in the skies. 
 
 2. Through Alpine meadows soft suffused 
 
 With rain, where thick the crocus blows, 
 Past the dark forges long disused, 
 The mule-track from Saint Laurent goes. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 The autumnal evening darkens round, 
 The wind is up, and drives the rain ; 
 While hark ! far down, with strangled sound 
 Doth the Dead Guiers' stream complain, 
 Where that wet smoke among the woods 
 Over his boiling cauldron broods. 
 
 3. Autumn departs — but still his mantle's fold 
 Rests on the groves of noble Somerville ; 
 Beneath a shroud of russet dropp'd with gold, 
 Tweed and his tributaries mingle still ; 
 Hoarser the wind, and deeper sounds the rill, 
 Yet lingering notes of silvan music swell, 
 
 The deep-toned cushat, and the redbreast shrill ; 
 And yet some tints of summer splendour tell 
 When the broad sun sinks down on Ettrick's western 
 fell. 
 
 1. Keats' Autumn. 2. M. Arnold's Stanzas. From the 
 Grande Chartreuse. 3. Lord of the Isles, c. i.~ 
 
I 2 6 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Autumn departs — from Gala's fields no more 
 Come rural sounds, our kindred banks to cheer ; 
 Blent with the stream, and gale that wafts it o'er, 
 No more the distant reaper's mirth we hear. 
 The last blithe shout hath died upon our ear, 
 And harvest-home hath hush'd the clanging wain, 
 On the waste hill no forms of life appear, 
 Save where, sad laggard of the autumnal train, 
 Some age-struck wanderer gleans few ears of scat- 
 ter'd grain. 
 
 Winter. — 
 
 4. an envious sneaping [nipping] frost, 
 
 That bites the first-born infants of the spring. 
 
 5. At evening a keen eastern breeze arose, 
 And the descending rain unsullied froze. 
 Soon as the silent shades of night withdrew, 
 The ruddy morn disclosed at once to view 
 The face of nature in a rich disguise, 
 
 And brighten'd every object to my eyes ; 
 
 For every shrub, and every blade of grass, 
 
 And every pointed thorn, seem'd wrought in glass : 
 
 In pearls and rubies rich the hawthorns show, 
 
 While through the ice the crimson berries glow. 
 
 The thick-sprung reeds which watery marshes yield, 
 
 Seem'd polished lances* in a hostile field. 
 
 The stag, in limpid currents, with surprise, 
 
 Sees crystal branches on his forehead rise : 
 
 The spreading oak, the beech, the towering pine, 
 
 Glazed over, in the freezing ether shine. 
 
 6. The wintry west extends his blast, 
 
 And hail and rain does blaw ; 
 Or the stormy north sends driving forth 
 
 The blinding sleet and snaw ; 
 While tumbling brown, the burn comes down, 
 
 And roars frae bank to brae ; 
 And bird and beast in covert rest, 
 
 And pass the heartless day. 
 
 7. November chill blaws loud wi' angry sugh ; 
 
 The short'ning winter day is near a close ; 
 
 4. Love's Labour Lost. 5. A. Philips, Epistle from 
 Copenhagen, 1709. 6. Burns' Winter. 7. The Cotter s 
 Saturday Night. 
 
 * See Southey's notes, quoted at page 75, No. 49. 
 
CLOUDS, ETC. 127 
 
 The miry beasts retreating frae the pleugh, 
 The black'ning trains o' craws to their repose ; 
 
 Clouds. — 
 
 i. Sometime, we see a cloud that's dragonish ; 
 A vapour, sometime, like a bear, or lion, 
 A tower'd citadel, a pendant rock, 
 A forked mountain, or blue promontory 
 With trees upon't, that nod unto the world, 
 And mock our eyes with air. Thou hast seen these 
 
 signs ; 
 They are black vesper's pageants. 
 
 2 yon fibrous cloud, 
 
 That catches but the palest tinge of even, 
 And which the straining eye can hardly seize 
 When melting into eastern twilight's shadow, 
 Were scarce so thin, so slight; 
 
 3. Underneath the young grey dawn 
 A multitude of dense, white fleecy clouds, 
 
 Were wandering in thick flocks along the mountains, 
 Shepherded by the slow, unwilling wind. 
 
 4. The chasm of sky above my head 
 
 Is Heaven's profoundest azure. No domain 
 
 For fickle, short-lived clouds to occupy, 
 
 Or to pass through ; — but rather an abyss 
 
 In which the everlasting stars abide, 
 
 And whose soft gloom and boundless depth might 
 
 tempt 
 The curious eye to look for them by day. 
 
 Sound. — 
 
 5. Hark! whence that rushing sound ? 
 
 * * * * 
 
 'Tis softer than the west wind's sigh ; 
 'Tis milder than the unmeasured notes 
 Of that strange lyre whose strings 
 The genii of the breezes sweep : 
 
 6. And listens to a heavy sound, 
 That moans the mossy turrets round. 
 Is it the roar of Teviot's tide, 
 
 That chafes against the scaur's red side ? 
 Is it the wind that swings the oaks ? 
 Is it the echo from the rocks ? 
 
 1. Antony and Cleopatra. 2, 3, 5. Shelley's Poems. 4. 
 The Excursion, b. ii. 6. Lay of the Last Minstrel, c. i. 
 
1 2 8 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 What may it be, the heavy sound, 
 
 That moans old Branksome's turrets round ? 
 
 Thunder. — 
 
 7. Cloud upon cloud, in dark and deepening mass, 
 Roll o'er the blackened waters ; the deep roar 
 Of distant thunder mutters awfully ; 
 Tempest unfolds its pinion o'er the gloom 
 
 That shrouds the boiling surge ; the pitiless fiend, 
 With all his winds and lightnings, tracks his prey ; 
 The torn deep yawns, — the vessel finds a grave 
 Beneath the jagged gulph. 
 
 8. Hast thou not mark'd, when o'er thy startled head 
 Sudden and deep the thunder-peal has roll'd, • 
 How, when its echoes fell, a silence dead 
 
 Sunk on the wood, the meadow, and the wold ? 
 The rye-grass shakes not on the sod-built fold, 
 The rustling aspen's leaves are mute and still, 
 The wall-flower waves not on the ruin'd hold, 
 Till, murmuring distant first, then near and shrill, 
 The savage whirlwind wakes, and sweeps the groaning 
 hill. 
 
 Rainbow. — 
 
 9. Those lines of rainbow light 
 
 Are like the moonbeams when they fall 
 Through some cathedral window. 
 
 10. The earth to thee her incense yields, 
 
 The lark thy welcome sings, 
 When, glittering in the freshened fields, 
 The snowy mushroom springs. 
 
 How glorious is thy girdle cast, 
 O'er mountain, tower, and town, 
 
 Or mirrored in the ocean vast, 
 A thousand fathoms down. 
 
 Terrestrial. 
 
 Scenery. — 
 
 1. Now I gain the mountain's brow, 
 
 What a landscape lies below ! 
 No clouds, no vapours intervene ; 
 But the gay, the open scene, 
 
 7, 9. Shelley's Poems. 8. Scott's Lord of the Isles, c. 3. 
 10. Campbell, The Rainbow. 1. Dyer's Grongar Hill. 
 
SCENERY, ETC. I 29 
 
 Does the face of nature show, 
 In all the hues of heaven's bow ; 
 And, swelling to embrace the light, 
 Spreads around beneath the sight. 
 
 2. There, where the swift Rhone's waters flow 
 
 Its verdant banks between ; 
 Where fragrant myrtles bending grow, 
 
 And Rhone reflects their green ; 
 There, where the vineyards deck the hills, 
 
 And o'er the valleys spread, 
 Which golden citrons' fragrance fills, 
 
 And plantains rear their head. 
 
 3. The sun is warm, the sky is clear, 
 The waves are dancing fast and bright, 
 Blue isles and snowy mountains wear 
 The purple noon's transparent light : 
 The breath of the moist air is light 
 Around its unexpanded buds ; 
 
 Like many a voice of one delight — 
 
 The winds', the birds', the ocean-floods' — 
 
 soft like Solitude's. 
 
 I see the Deep's untrampled floor 
 With green and purple sea-weeds strown ; 
 I see the waves upon the shore 
 Like light dissolved in star-showers thrown : 
 I sit upon the sands alone ; 
 The lightning of the moon-tide ocean 
 Is flashing round me, and a tone 
 Arises from its measured motion — 
 How sweet ! did any heart now share in my emotion. 
 
 4. On the mountain dawns the day ; 
 
 # * * • 
 
 The mist hath left the mountain gray, 
 Springlets in the dawn are streaming, 
 Diamonds on the brake are gleaming, 
 And foresters have busy been 
 To track the buck in thicket green. 
 
 Island. — 
 
 5. This happy breed of men, this little world ; 
 
 2. Bowring's Russian Poets (Batiushkov). 3. Shelley's 
 Stanzas, Naples. 4. Scott's Hunting Song. 5. King 
 Richard II. 
 
 K 
 
I 3 O NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 This precious stone set in the silver sea, 
 Which serves it in the office of a wall, 
 
 * # * 
 
 This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England, 
 
 * * * 
 
 England, bound in with the triumphant sea, 
 Whose rocky shore beats back the envious siege 
 Of wat'ry Neptune. — 
 
 6. that pale, that white-fac'd shore, 
 
 Whose foot spurns back the ocean's roaring tides, 
 And coops from other lands her islanders, 
 Even till that England, hedg'd in with the main, 
 That water-walled bulwark, still secure. 
 
 Sea Coast. — 
 
 7. Lo ! where the heath, with withering brake grown o'er, 
 Lends the light turf that warms the neighbouring 
 
 poor; 
 From thence a length of burning sand appears, 
 Where the thin harvest waves its wither'd ears ; 
 Rank weeds, that every art and care defy, 
 Reign o'er the land, and rob the blighted rye : 
 There thistles stretch their prickly arms afar, 
 And to the rugged infant threaten war ; 
 There poppies nodding, mock the hope of toil ; 
 There the blue bugloss paints the sterile soil ; 
 Hardy and high, above the slender sheaf, 
 The slimy mallow waves her silky leaf; 
 O'er the young shoot, the charlock throws a shade, 
 And clasping tares cling round the sickly blade ; 
 With mingled tints the rocky coasts abound, 
 And a sad splendour vainly shines around. 
 
 8 The murmuring surge, 
 
 That on the unnumber'd idle pebbles chafes. 
 
 9. Sweet is the night air ! 
 
 Only, from the long line of spray 
 Where the ebb meets the moon-blanch'd sand, 
 Listen ! you hear the grating roar 
 Of pebbles which the waves suck back, and fling, 
 At their return, up the high strand, 
 Begin and cease, and then again begin, 
 
 6. King John. 7. Crabbe, The Village. 8. King Lear. 
 9. Arnold's Poems, Dover Beach. 
 
WASTES, ETC. 131 
 
 With tremulous cadence slow, and bring 
 The eternal note of sadness in. 
 
 Wastes. — 
 
 10. A barren detested vale, you see, it is : 
 The trees, though summer, yet forlorn and lean, 
 O'ercome with moss, and baleful mistletoe. 
 Here never shines the sun ; here nothing breeds, 
 Unless the nightly owl, or fatal raven. 
 
 11. 'Mid stormy vapours ever driving by, 
 Where ospreys, cormorants, and herons cry ; 
 Where hardly given the hopeless waste to cheer, 
 Denied the bread of life the foodful ear, 
 Dwindles the pear on autumn's latest spra}', 
 And apple sickens pale in summer's ray ; 
 
 Mountains. — 
 
 1. But when a mountain's foot I reach'd, where clos'd 
 The valley, that had pierc'd my heart with dread, 
 
 I look'd aloft, and saw their shoulders broad 
 
 Already vested with that planet's beam, 
 
 Who leads all wanderers safe through every way. 
 
 2. The place where to descend the precipice 
 We came, was rough as Alp, and on its verge 
 Such object lay, as every eye would shun. 
 
 As is that ruin, which Adice's stream 
 On this side Trento struck, should'ring the wave, 
 Or loos'd by earthquake or for lack of prop ; 
 For from the mountain's summit, whence it mov'd 
 To the low level, so the headlong rock 
 Is shiver'd, that some passage it might give 
 To him who from above would pass : e'en such 
 Into the chasm was the descent : — 
 
 3. As when from mountain tops the dusky clouds 
 Ascending, while the north wind sleeps, o'erspread 
 Heaven's cheerful face, the low'ring element 
 Scowls o'er the darken'd landscape snow, or show'r ; 
 If chance the radiant sun with farewell sweet 
 Extend his ev'ning beam, the fields revive, 
 
 The birds their notes renew, and bleating herds 
 Attest their joy, that hill and valley rings. 
 
 4. Sees Caledonia, in romantic view : 
 
 Her airy mountains, from the waving main 
 
 10. Titus Andronicus. 11. Wordsworth. (See Bio- 
 graphia Literaria, chap, iv.) 1. Gary's Dante (Hell), c. i. 
 2. Ibid., c. xii. 3. Paradise Lost, b. ii. 4. The Seasons. 
 
 K 2 
 
1 3 2 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Invested with a keen diffusive sky, 
 
 1 her forests huge, 
 
 Incult, robust, and tall, by Nature's hand 
 Planted of old ; her azure lakes between, 
 Poured out extensive 4 and of watery wealth 
 Full ; winding deep, and green, her fertile vales, 
 With many a cool translucent brimming flood 
 Washed lovely, from the Tweed 
 
 5. The meeting cliffs each deep-sunk glen divides, 
 The woods, wild-scatter'd, clothe their ample sides ; 
 Th' outstretching lake, embosom'd 'mong the hills, 
 The eye with wonder and amazement fills ; 
 
 * # * * 
 
 The lawns, wood-fringed in Nature's native taste ; 
 The hillocks, dropped in Nature's careless haste ; 
 The arches, striding o'er the new-born stream; 
 The village, glittering in the moontide beam 
 
 6. The rival of the Andes, whose dark brow 
 
 Lowered o'er the silver sea. 
 * * * 
 
 far below 
 
 Calm as a slumbering babe, 
 Tremendous Ocean lay, 
 The mirror of its stillness showed 
 The pale and waning stars, 
 
 7. The broad-breasted rock 
 Glasses his rugged forehead in the sea. 
 
 8. I climbed the dark brow of the mighty Helvellyn, 
 
 Lakes and mountains beneath me gleamed misty 
 and wide ; 
 All was still, save by fits when the eagle was yelling, 
 
 And starting around me the echoes replied. 
 On the right, Striden-edge round the Red-tarn was 
 
 bending, 
 And Catchedicam its left verge was defending, 
 One huge nameless rock in the front was ascending, 
 When I marked the sad spot where the wanderer 
 had died. 
 
 5. Burns, Lines written at Kenmore, Taymouth. 6. Queen 
 Mob. 7. S. T. Coleridge, Fragments. 8. Scott, Death of 
 Dr. Gough. 
 
MOUNTAINS, ETC. I 33 
 
 g. The cliffs that rear their haughty head 
 High o'er the river's darksome bed, 
 Were now all naked, wild, and grey, 
 Now waving all with greenwood spray ; 
 Here trees to every crevice clung, 
 And o'er the dell their branches hung ; 
 And there, all splinter'd and uneven, 
 The shiver'd rocks, ascend to heaven ; 
 Oft, too, the ivy swathed their breast, 
 And wreathed its garland round their crest, 
 Or from the spires bade loosely flare 
 Its tendrils in the middle air. 
 As pennons wont to wave of old 
 
 O'er the high feast of Baron bold, 
 
 * * * # 
 
 Such and more wild is Greta's roar, 
 And such the echoes from her shore. 
 
 Rocks and Caves. — 
 
 10. Nature's most secret steps 
 
 He [the poet] like her shadow, has pursued, where'er 
 
 The red volcano over-canopies 
 
 Its fields of snow and pinnacles of ice 
 
 With burning smoke ; or where bitumen lakes, 
 
 On black bare-pointed islets ever beat 
 
 With sluggish surge ; or, where the secret caves 
 
 Rugged and dark, winding among the springs 
 
 Of fire and poison, inaccessible 
 
 To avarice or pride, their starry domes 
 
 Of diamond and gold expand above 
 
 Numberless and immeasurable halls 
 
 Frequent with crystal column, and clear shines 
 
 Of pearl, and thrones radiant with chrysolite. 
 
 Rivers. — 
 
 i. How am I pleased to search the hills and woods 
 For rising springs and celebrated floods ! 
 To view the Nar, tumultuous in his course, 
 And trace the smooth Clitumnus to his source, 
 To see the Mincio draw his watery store, 
 Through the long windings of a fruitful shore, 
 And hoary Albula's infected tide 
 O'er the warm bed of smoking sulphur glide. 
 
 9. Rokeby, c. ii. 10. Shelley's Alastor. 1. Addison's 
 Letter from Italy . 
 
1 34 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 i. The Kennet swift, for silver eels renown T d ; 
 The Loddon slow, with verdant alders crown'd; 
 Cole, whose dark streams his flowery islands lave ; 
 And chalky Wey, that rolls a milky wave ; 
 The blue, transparent Vandalis appears ; 
 The gulfy Lee his sedgy tresses rears ; 
 And sullen Mole, that hides his diving flood ; 
 And silent Darent, stain'd with Danish blood, 
 
 2. Here Ouse, slow winding through a level plain 
 Of spacious meads with cattle sprinkled o'er, 
 Conducts the eye along his sinuous course 
 Delighted. There, fast rooted in their bank, 
 Stand, never overlooked, our favourite elms, 
 That screen the herdsman's solitary hut ; 
 While far beyond, and overthwart the stream 
 That, as with molten glass, inlays the vale, 
 The sloping land recedes into the clouds ; 
 Displaying on its varied side the grace 
 Of hedge-row beauties numberless, square tower, 
 Tall spire, from which the sound of cheerful bells 
 Just undulates upon the listening ear, 
 Groves, heaths, and smoking villages, remote. 
 
 4. Amang the bonnie, winding banks, 
 
 Where Doon rins, wimplin', [meandering] clear, 
 * * * * 
 
 Whiles [sometimes] owre a linn the burnie plays, 
 
 As through the glen it wimpl't ; 
 Whiles round a rocky scaur [cliff] it strays ; 
 
 Whiles in a wiel [eddy] it dimpl't ; 
 Whiles glitterin to the nightly rays, 
 
 Wi' bickerin', [staggering] dancin' dazzle ; 
 Whiles cookit [hidden] underneath the braes, 
 
 Below the spreading hazel, 
 Unseen that night. 
 
 5. Come Lucy ! while 'tis morning hour, 
 
 The woodland brook we needs must pass ; 
 So, ere the sun assume his power. 
 We shelter in our poplar bower, 
 Where dew lies long upon the flower, 
 
 Though vanish'd from the velvet grass. 
 Curbing the stream, this stony ridge 
 May serve us for a silvan bridge ; 
 
 2. Windsor Forest. 3. Cowper's Task, b. i. 4. Burns' 
 Halloween. 5. Scott's Bridal of Triermain. 
 
RIVERS, ETC. I35 
 
 For here compell'd to disunite, 
 
 Round petty isles the runnels glide, 
 And chafing off their puny spite, 
 The shallow murmurs waste their might, 
 Yielding to footstep free and light 
 A dry-shod pass from side to side. 
 
 6. River ! that in silence windest 
 
 Throughfthe meadows, bright and free, 
 Till at length thy rest thou findest 
 In the bosom of the sea ! 
 
 Bower. — 
 
 7. The thick young grass arose in fresher green : 
 The mound was newly made, no sight could pass 
 Betwixt the nice partitions of the grass, 
 
 The well-united sods so closely lay, 
 And all around the shades defended it from day ; 
 For sycamores with eglantine were spread, 
 A hedge about the sides, a covering over-head. 
 And so the fragrant brier was wove between, 
 The sycamore and flowers were mix'd with green, 
 That nature seem'd to vary the delight, 
 And satisfied at once the smell and sight. 
 
 * * *• 
 
 And the fresh eglantine exhaled a breath, 
 Whose odours were of power to raise from death. 
 
 * sj« ^ ^c 
 
 Thus as I mused, I cast aside my eye, 
 
 And saw a medlar-tree was planted nigh ; 
 
 The spreading branches made a goodly show, 
 
 And full of opening blooms was every bough ; 
 
 A goldfinch there I saw with gaudy pride 
 
 Of painted plumes, that hopp'd from side to side, 
 
 Still pecking as she pass'd, and still she drew 
 
 The sweets from every flower, and suck'd the dew ; 
 
 Sufficed at length, she warbled in her throat, 
 
 And tuned her voice to many a merry note, 
 
 But indistinct, and neither sweet nor clear, 
 
 Yet such as sooth'd my soul, and pleased my ear. 
 
 8. On beds of daisies idly laid, 
 
 The willow waving o'er my head, 
 Now morning, on the bending stem, 
 Hangs the round and glittering gem, 
 
 6. Longfellow's River Charles. 7. Dryden's Flower and 
 the Leaf. 8. Dr. T. Warton's Retirement. 
 
i 3 6 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Lull'd by the lapse of yonder spring, 
 Of nature's various charms I sing : 
 
 the roof 
 
 Of thickest covert was inwoven shade, 
 
 Laurel and myrtle, and what higher grew 
 
 Of firm and fragrant leaf; on either side 
 
 Acanthus and each odorous bushy shrub 
 
 Fenc'd up the verdant wall, each beauteous flow'r, 
 
 Iris all hues, roses, and jessamin 
 
 Rear'd high, their flourish'd heads between, and wrought 
 
 Mosaic ; under foot the violet, 
 
 Crocus, and hyacinth with rich inlay 
 
 Border'd the ground, more colour'd than with stone 
 
 Of costliest emblem: other creatures here, 
 
 Beast, bird, insect, or worm, durst enter none ; 
 
 Such was their awe of man.- 
 
 10. The laverock whistled from the cloud ; 
 The stream was lively, but not loud ; 
 From the white thorn the May-flower shed ; 
 Its dewy fragrance round our head : 
 Not Ariel lived more merrily 
 Under the blossom'd bough than we. 
 
 Garden. — 
 
 i. I love the garden wild and wide, 
 
 Where oaks have plum-trees by their side, 
 
 Where woodbines and twisting vine 
 
 Clip round the pear-tree and the pine ; 
 
 Where mixt jonquils and gowans [daisies] grow, 
 
 And roses midst rank clover blow, 
 
 Upon a bank of a clear strand, 
 
 Its wimplings led by nature's hand ; 
 
 Though docks and brambles, here and there, 
 
 May sometimes cheat the gard'ner's care, 
 
 Yet this to me's a paradise, 
 
 Compared to prim cut plots' and nice, 
 
 Where nature has to art resign'd, 
 
 And all looks stiff, mean, and confined. 
 
 2. It was a plot 
 
 Of garden ground run wild, its matted weeds 
 
 Marked with the steps of those, whom, as they passed, 
 
 The gooseberry trees that shot in long lank slips, 
 
 9. Paradise Lost, b. iv. 10. Marmion. 1. Allan Ram- 
 say's Epistles. 2. The Excursion. 
 
GARDENS, ETC. I 37 
 
 Or currants, hanging from their leafless stems, 
 In scanty strings, had tempted to o'erleap 
 The broken wall. I, * * * 
 
 Where two tall hedge-rows of thick alder boughs 
 Joined in a cold damp nook, espied a well 
 Shrouded with wild-flowers and plumy fern. 
 
 3. Parks with oak and chesnut shady 
 
 Parks and ordered gardens great. 
 
 Husbandry. — 
 
 4. When cheerful day begins to fade, 
 
 * # * 
 
 Loud bleating from the neighbouring meads, 
 His flock the shepherd homeward leads ; 
 And broad of brow and sleek of skin, 
 Their stalls the lowing oxen win. 
 High piled with sheaves of golden grain, 
 Rolls swinging in the laden wain, 
 The blessings of the bounteous ground 
 With many-colour'd garland crown'd ; 
 And labour ended, gay advance 
 The youthful reapers to the dance. 
 
 Forest Fire. — 
 
 5. So, when the storms through Indian forests rave, 
 And bend the pliant canes in curling wave. 
 Grind their siliceous joints with ceaseless ire, 
 Till bright emerge the ruby seeds of fire, 
 
 A brazen light bedims the burning sky, 
 And shuts each shrinking star's refulgent eye ; 
 The forest roars, where crimson surges play, 
 And flash through lurid night infernal day ; 
 Floats far and loud the hoarse discordant yell 
 Of ravening pards, which harmless crowd the dell, 
 While boa-snakes, to wet savannahs trail 
 Awkward a lingering lazy length of tail ; 
 The barbarous tiger whets his fangs no more, 
 To lap with torturing pause his victim's gore ; 
 Curb'd of their rage, hysenas gaunt are tame, 
 And shrink, begirt with all-devouring flame. 
 
 Animal Creation. — 
 
 6. The timorous hare, 
 
 Grown so familiar with her frequent guest, 
 
 3. Tennyson's Lord of Burleigh. 4. Lambert's Schiller's 
 Lay of the Bell. 5. Dr. Leyden's Eastern Conflagration. 
 6. Cowper's Animals Happy. 
 
I 3 8 NATURE-STUDY, 
 
 Scarce shuns me ; and the stock-dove unalarm'd 
 
 Sits cooing in the pine-tree, nor suspends 
 
 His long-love ditty for my near approach. 
 
 Drawn from his refuge in some lonely elm, 
 
 That age or injury has hollowed deep, 
 
 Where on his bed of wool and matted leaves. 
 
 He has outslept the winter, ventures forth 
 
 To frisk awhile, and bask in the warm sun, 
 
 The squirrel, flippant, pert, and full of play ; 
 
 He sees me, and at once, swift as a bird, 
 
 Ascends the neighbouring beech ; where whisks his 
 
 brush 
 And perks his ears, and stamps and cries aloud 
 With all the prettiness of feign'd alarm, 
 And anger insignificantly fierce. 
 
 7. From the thick copse the roebucks bound, 
 
 The startled red-deer scuds the plain, 
 For the — bugle 
 
 Has roused their mountain haunts again. 
 
 8. Calm amid scenes of havock, in his own 
 Huge strength impregnable, the elephant 
 Offendeth none, but leads a quiet life 
 Among his own contemporary trees, 
 Till nature lays him gently down to rest 
 Beneath the palm, which he was wont to make 
 His prop in slumber ; there his relics lay 
 Longer than life itself had dwelt within them. 
 
 9. Amphibious monsters haunted the lagoon ; 
 The Hippopotamus, amidst the flood, 
 Flexile and active as the smallest swimmer; 
 But on the bank, ill-balanc'd and infirm, 
 
 He graz'd the herbage, with huge head declin'd, 
 
 Or lean'd to rest against some ancient tree. 
 
 The Crocodile, the dragon of the waters, 
 
 An iron panoply, fell as the plague, 
 
 And merciless as famine, cranch'd his prey ; 
 
 While from his jaws, with dreadful fangs all serried, 
 
 The life-blood dyed the waves with deadly streams. 
 
 The Seal and the Sea-lion, from the gulf 
 
 Came forth, and, couching with their little ones, 
 
 Slept on the shelving rocks that girt the shore, 
 
 Securing prompt retreat from sudden danger. 
 
 7. Scott's Cadyow Castle. 8. Montgomery, The Ele- 
 phant. 9. Ibid. Amphibious Animals. 
 
ANIMAL CREATION. 1 39 
 
 The pregnant Turtle, stealing out at eve, 
 With anxious eye and trembling heart, explor'd 
 The loneliest coves, and in the loose warm sand 
 Deposited her eggs, which the sun hatch'd : 
 Hence the young brood, that never knew a parent, 
 Unburrow'd and by instinct sought the sea ; 
 Nature herself, with her own gentle hand, 
 Dropping them one by one into the flood, 
 And laughing to behold their antic joy, 
 When launch'd in their maternal element. 
 
 Pigeons. — 
 
 1. As a wild flock of pigeons, to their food 
 Collected, blade or tares, without their pride 
 Accustom'd, and in still and quiet sort, 
 
 If aught alarm them, suddenly desert 
 
 Their meal, assail'd by more important cares. 
 
 2. As doves 
 
 By fond desire invited, on wide wings 
 
 And firm, to their sweet nest returning home, 
 Cleave the air, wafted by their wills along. 
 
 Starlings. — 
 
 3. As in large troops 
 
 And multitudinous, when winter reigns, 
 
 The starlings on their wings are borne abroad. 
 
 Skylark. — 
 
 4. Lo ! here the gentle lark, weary of rest, 
 From his moist cabinet mounts up on high, 
 And wakes the morning, from whose silver breast 
 The sun ariseth in his majesty ; 
 
 Who doth the world so gloriously behold, 
 That cedar-tops and hills seem burnish'd gold. 
 
 5. The skylark warbles high 
 
 His trembling thrilling ecstacy ; 
 And lessening from the dazzled sight, 
 Melts into air and liquid light. 
 
 6. Hail to thee, blithe Spirit ! 
 
 Bird thou never wert, 
 That from heaven, or near it 
 Pourest thy full heart 
 In profuse strains of unpremeditated art. 
 
 1. Cary's Dante (Purgatory.) 2, 3. Ibid. (Hell), c. v. 
 4. Shakspeare's Poems. 5. T. Gray's Poems. 6. Shelley, 
 To a Skylark. 
 
140 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 In the golden lightning 
 
 Of the sunken sun 
 O'er which clouds are brightening, 
 Thou dost float and run, 
 Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun. 
 
 The pale purple even 
 
 Melts around thy flight ; 
 Like a star of heaven 
 In the broad daylight 
 Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight. 
 
 7. Leave to the nightingale her shady wood ; 
 A privacy of glorious light is thine, 
 Whence thou dost pour upon the world a flood 
 Of harmony, with instinct more divine ; 
 Type of the wise, who soar, but never roam — 
 True to the kindred points of Heaven and Home ! 
 
 8. thou, light-winged Dryad of the trees. 
 
 In some melodious plot 
 
 Of beechen screen, and shadows numberless, 
 
 Singest of summer in full-throated ease. 
 * * * * 
 
 Adieu ! adieu ! thy plaintive anthem fades 
 Past the near meadows, over the still stream, 
 Up the hill-side ; and now 'tis buried deep 
 In the next valley-glades : 
 Was it a vision, or a waking dream ? 
 
 Fled is that music : — Do I wake or sleep ? 
 
 Thrush. — 
 
 9. Sing on, sweet thrush, upon the leafless bough, 
 
 Sing on, sweet bird, I listen to thy strain, 
 See aged Winter, 'mid his surly reign, 
 At thy blythe carol clears his furrowed brow. 
 
 Petrel. — 
 
 1. O'er the deep ! o'er the deep ! 
 
 Where the whale, and the shark, and sword-fish sleep, 
 Outflying the blast and the driving rain, 
 The Petrel telleth her tale — in vain : 
 For the mariner curseth the warning bird 
 Who bringeth him news of the storm unheard ! 
 
 7. Wordsworth, To the Skylark. 8. Keats' Ode to a 
 Nightingale. 9. Burns' Poems, Sonnet. 1. Barry Corn- 
 wall's Stormy Petrel. 
 
ANIMAL CREATION. 141 
 
 Corn-Crake. — 
 
 2. Her callow brood around her cowering cling, — 
 
 She braves its edge — [the scythe's] — she mourns her 
 
 severed wing ; 
 Oft had she taught them with a mother's love, 
 To note the pouncing merlin from the dove ; 
 The slowly floating buzzard's eye to shun, 
 As o'er the meads he hovers in the sun ; 
 The weazel's sly imposture to prevent; 
 And mark the marten by his musky scent ; — 
 Ah ! fruitless skill, which taught her not to scan 
 The scythe afar, and ruthless arm of man ! 
 
 Cuckoo. — 
 
 3. Delightful visitant ! with thee 
 
 I hail the time of flowers, 
 And hear the sound of music sweet 
 From birds among the bowers. 
 
 Sweet bird ! thy bower is ever green, 
 
 Thy sky is ever clear ; 
 Thou hast no sorrow in thy song, 
 
 No winter in thy year ! 
 
 4. I hear thee babbling to the vale 
 Of sunshine and of flowers ; 
 And unto me thou bring'st a tale 
 Of visionary hours. 
 
 Thrice welcome, darling of the Spring ! 
 
 Even yet thou art to me 
 
 No bird ; but an invisible thing, 
 
 A voice, a mystery. 
 
 Linnet. — 
 
 5. Hail to thee, far above the rest 
 
 In joy of voice and pinion, 
 Thou, Linnet ! in thy green array, 
 Presiding spirit here to-day, 
 Dost lead the revels of the May, 
 
 And this is thy dominion. 
 
 While birds, and butterflies, and flowers 
 Make all one band of paramours, 
 Thou, ranging up and down the bowers, 
 
 2. Dr. Leyden, The Corn-Crake. 3. Logan's Ode to the 
 Cuckoo. 4. Wordsworth, To the Cuckoo. 5. Ibid. The 
 Green Linnet. 
 
I4 2 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Art sole in thy employment ; 
 A life, a presence like the air, 
 Scattering thy gladness without care, 
 
 * * * # 
 
 Upon yon tuft of hazel trees, 
 That twinkle to the gusty breeze, 
 Behold him perched in ecstacies, 
 
 Yet seeming still to hover ; 
 There ! where the flutter of his wings 
 Upon his back and body flings 
 Shadows and snnny glimmerings, 
 
 That cover him all over. 
 
 Black-cock. — 
 
 6. At morn the black-cock trims his jetty wing, 
 
 'Tis morning prompts the linnet's blithest lay, 
 All Nature's children feel the matin spring 
 Of life reviving, with reviving day. 
 
 Bittern. — 
 
 7. The bittern clamour'd from the moss, 
 
 The wind blew loud and shrill ; 
 
 Swan. — 
 
 8. The Swan on still St. Mary's lake 
 Floats double, swan and shadow. 
 
 Fish.— 
 
 9. Our plenteous streams a various race supply, 
 The bright-eyed perch, with fins of Tyrian dye, 
 The silver eel, in shining volumes roll'd, 
 
 The yellow carp, in scales bedropp'd with gold, 
 Swift trouts, diversified with crimson stains, 
 And pikes, the tyrants of the watery plains. 
 
 1. No rocks impede thy dimpling course, 
 That sweetly warbles o'er its bed, 
 With white, round, polish'd pebbles spread; 
 While, lightly poised, the scaly brood 
 In myriads cleave thy crystal flood ; 
 The springing trout in speckled pride; 
 The salmon, monarch of the tide ; 
 The ruthless pike, intent on war; 
 The silver eel, and mottled par. 
 
 6. Lady of the Lake, c. ii. 7. Eve of St. John. 8. Shelley's 
 Poems. 9. Windsor Forest, 1. T. Smollet's Ode on 
 Leven-Water. 
 
FISH, ETC. 143 
 
 Devolving from thy parent lake, 
 A charming maze thy waters make, 
 By bowers of birch, and groves of pine, 
 And edges flower'd with eglantine. 
 
 Nautilus. — 
 
 2. Where Ausonian summers glowing, 
 Warm the deep to life and joyance, 
 And gentle zephyrs nimbly blowing, 
 Wanton with the waves, that flowing 
 By many a land of ancient glory, 
 And many an isle renown'd in story, 
 Leap along with gladsome buoyance, 
 
 There Marinere, 
 
 Dost thou appear, 
 In fairy pinnace gaily flashing, 
 Through the white foam proudly dashing, 
 The joyous playmate of the buxom breeze, 
 The fearless fondling of the mighty seas. 
 
 Frogs, &c. — 
 
 3. E'en as the frogs, that of a wat'ry moat 
 Stand at the brink, with the jaws only out, 
 Their feet and of the trunk all else concealed, 
 Thus on each part the sinners stood, 
 
 * * # « 
 
 As it befals that oft one frog remains 
 While the next springs away : 
 
 4. 'Tis now th' apartment of the toad ; 
 And there the fox securely feeds ; 
 And there the poisonous adder breeds, 
 Conceal'd in ruins, moss, and weeds; 
 While ever and anon, there falls 
 Huge heaps of hoary moulder'd walls. 
 
 Insects. — 
 
 5. He knew the plants in mountains, wood, or mead ; 
 He knew the worms that on the foliage feed ; 
 Knew the small tribes, that 'scape the careless eye, 
 The plants' disease that breeds the embryo-fly; 
 And the small creatures who on bark or bough 
 Enjoy their changes, changed we know not how ; 
 But now th' imperfect being scarcely moves, 
 
 And now takes wing and seeks the sky it loves. 
 
 2. H. Coleridge, To the Nautilus. 3. Cary's Dante 
 {Hell), c. xxii. 4. Dyer's Grongar Hill. 5. Crabbe's 
 Tales of the Hall. 
 
1 44 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Reptiles and Insects. — 
 
 6. Nature's reptile scene, 
 
 ¥ # * * :*: 
 
 Or multipede, earth's leafy verdure creep : 
 
 Or on the pool's new mantling surface play, 
 
 And range a drop, as whales may range the sea, 
 
 Or ply the rivulet with supple oars, 
 
 And oft, amphibious, course the neighb'ring shores ; 
 
 Or shelt'ring, quit the dank inclement sky, 
 
 And condescend to lodge where princes lie ; 
 
 There tread the ceiling, an inverted floor, 
 
 And from its precipice depend secure : 
 
 Or who nor creep, nor fly, nor walk, nor swim, 
 
 But claim new motion with peculiar limb, 
 
 Successive spring with quick elastic bound, 
 
 And thus transported pass the refluent ground. 
 
 * . * * * 
 
 who a twofold apparatus share, 
 
 Natives of earth, and habitants of air; 
 
 * * * # 
 
 Who that beholds the summer's glist'ring swarms, 
 Ten thousand thousand gaily gilded forms, 
 In volant dance of mix'd rotation play, 
 Bask in the beam, and beautify the day ; 
 Would think these airy wantons so adorn, 
 Were late his vile antipathy and scorn, 
 Prone to the dust, or reptile through the mire, 
 
 And ever thence unlikely to aspire ? 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Though numberless these insect tribes of air, 
 Though numberless each tribe and species fair, 
 Who wing the moon, and brighten in the blaze, 
 Innumerous as the sands which bend the seas ; 
 These have their organs, arts, and arms, and tools, 
 And functions exercised by various rules ; 
 
 * * * * 
 
 All by their dam's prophetic care receive 
 Whate'er peculiar indigence can crave : 
 Profuse at hand the plenteous table's spread, 
 And various appetites are aptly fed. 
 Nor less each organ suits each place of birth, 
 Finn'd in the flood, or reptile o'er the earth ; 
 Each organ, apt to each precarious state, 
 As for eternity design'd complete. 
 Thus nursed, these inconsiderate wretches grow, 
 Take all as due, still thoughtless that they owe. 
 
 6. H. Brooke's Universal Beauty, 1783. 
 
ANIMALCULE, ETC. 1 45 
 
 Animalcule (Water and air). — 
 
 7. their unseen people. These concealed 
 
 By the kind art of forming Heaven, escape 
 The grosser eye of man : for if the worlds 
 
 In worlds enclosed should on his senses burst, 
 From cates ambrosial, and the nectared bowl, 
 He would abhorrent turn ; and in dead night, 
 When silence sleeps o'er all, be stunned with noise. 
 * * * * 
 
 His works the smallest part 
 
 Exceeds the narrow vision of her [haughty Igno- 
 rance's] mind. 
 
 Vegetable Creation. 
 Wood, &c. — 
 
 8. In the midway of this our mortal life, 
 I found me in a gloomy wood, astray 
 Gone from the path direct : and e'en to tell 
 It were no easy task, how savage wild 
 
 That forest, how robust and rough its growth, 
 Which to remember only, my dismay 
 Renews its bitterness not far from death. 
 
 9. A dismal grove of sable yew, 
 
 With whose sad tints were mingled seen 
 The blighted fir's sepulchral green. 
 Seem'd that the trees their shadows cast, 
 The earth that nourish'd them to blast : 
 For never knew that swarthy grove 
 The verdant hue that fairies love ; 
 Nor wilding green, nor woodland flower, 
 Arose within its baleful bower. 
 
 i. Below me trees unnumber'd rise, 
 
 Beautiful in various dyes ; 
 The gloomy pine, the poplar blue, 
 The yellow beech, the sable yew, 
 The slender fir, that taper grows, 
 The sturdy oak with broad-spread boughs, 
 And beyond the purple grove, 
 
 Lies a long and level lawn. 
 
 2. This is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines 
 and the hemlocks, 
 
 7. The Seasons. 8. Cary's Dante {Hell), c. i. 9. Rokeby. 
 1, Dyer's Grongar Hill. 2. Longfellow's Poems, Evan- 
 geline. 
 
146 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct 
 in the twilight, 
 
 Stand like druids of eld, with voices sad and 
 prophetic, 
 
 Stand like harpers hoar, with beards that rest on 
 their bosoms. 
 
 Loud from its rocky caverns, the deep-voiced neigh- 
 bouring ocean 
 
 Speaks, and in accents disconsolate answers the 
 wail of the forest. 
 
 3. O hemlock-tree ! O hemlock-tree ! how faithful are 
 
 thy branches ! 
 Green not alone in summer time, 
 But in the winter's frost and rime ! 
 O hemlock-tree, O hemlock-tree ! how faithful are thy 
 branches ! 
 Beech. — 
 
 4. O leave this barren spot to me! 
 
 Spare, woodman, spare the beechen tree ! 
 
 Though bush or flowret never grow 
 
 My dark, unwarming shade below ; 
 * * * # 
 
 Nor fruit of autumn, blossom-born, 
 My green and glossy leaves adorn ; 
 Nor murmuring tribes from me derive 
 Th' ambrosial treasures of the hive ; 
 
 Ash. — 
 
 5. The mountain-ash, 
 Decked with autumnal berries that outshine 
 Spring's richest blossoms, yields a splendid show, 
 Amid the leafy woods ; and ye have seen, 
 
 By a brook-side or solitary tarn, 
 How she her station doth adorn : the pool 
 Glows at her feet, and all the gloomy rocks 
 Are brightened round her. In his native vale 
 Such and so glorious did this youth appear. 
 
 Sweet Briar. — 
 
 6. As pondering as I pac'd, my wandering led 
 To a lone river bank of yellow sand, — 
 
 The lov'd haunt of the ouzel, whose blithe wing 
 Wanton'd from stone to stone — and, on a mound 
 Of verdurous turf with wild-flowers diamonded 
 
 3. Longfellow's Poems. From the German. 4. Campbell, 
 The Beech Tree's Petition. 5. The Excursion. 6. D. M. 
 Moir, The Eglantine. 
 
IVY, ETC. 147 
 
 (Hare-bell and lychnis, thyme and camomile,) 
 
 Sprang in the majesty of natural pride 
 
 An Eglantine — the red rose of the wood, — 
 
 Its cany boughs with threatening prickles arm'd, 
 
 Rich in its blossoms and sweet-scented leaves. 
 
 Ivy. — 
 
 7. ancient towers 
 
 Whose ragged walls the ivy creeps, 
 And with her arms from falling keeps : 
 So both a safety from the wind 
 On mutual dependence find. 
 'Tis now the raven's bleak abode. 
 
 Gorse. — 
 
 8. Overgrown with fern, and rough 
 
 With prickly gorse, that, shapeless and deform, 
 And dang'rous to the touch, has yet its bloom, 
 And decks itself with ornaments of gold, 
 Yields no unpleasing ramble ; there the turf 
 Smells fresh, and, rich in odorif'rous herbs 
 And fungous fruits of earth, regales the sense 
 With luxury of unexpected sweets. 
 
 Rose, &c. — 
 
 9. Brought from the woods the honeysuckle twines 
 Around the porch, and seems, in that trim place, 
 A plant no longer wild ; the cultured rose 
 
 There blossoms, strong in health, and will be soon 
 Roof-high ; the wild pink crowns the garden-wall, 
 And with the flowers are intermingled stones 
 Sparry and bright, — 
 
 1. Soon will the high midsummer pomps come on, 
 
 Soon will the musk carnations break and swell, 
 Soon shall we have gold-dusted snapdragon, 
 
 Sweet- William with its homely cottage-smell. 
 And stocks in fragrant blow ; 
 Roses that down the alleys shine afar, 
 
 And open, jasmine-muffled lattices, 
 
 And groups under the dreaming garden-trees, 
 And the full moon, and the white evening-star. 
 
 2. And from the thyme upon the height, 
 And from the elder-blossom white 
 And pale dog-roses in the hedge, 
 And from the mint-plant in the sedge, 
 
 7. Dyer's Grongar Hill, 8. Cowper, The Task, b. i. 
 9. Wordsworth's Excursion. 1. Arnold's Poems, Thyrsis. 
 2. Ibid. Bacchanalia. 
 
 L 2 
 
148 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 In puffs of balm the night-air blows 
 
 The perfume which the day foregoes. 
 
 And on the pure horizon far, 
 
 See, pulsing with the first-born star, 
 
 The liquid sky above the hill ! 
 
 The evening comes, the field is still. 
 
 3. I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows, 
 Where ox-lips and the nodding violet grows ; 
 Quite over-canopy'd with luscious woodbine, 
 With sweet musk-roses, and with eglantine : A. ii. 
 
 # * * * 
 
 And that same dew, which sometimes on the buds 
 Was wont to swell, like round and orient pearls, 
 Stood now within the pretty flow'ret's eyes, 
 Like tears, that did their own disgrace bewail. A. iv. 
 
 Flowers. — 
 
 4. A sensitive plant in a garden grew, 
 
 And the young winds fed it with silver dew ; 
 And it opened its fan-like leaves to the light. 
 And closed them beneath the kisses of night. 
 
 And the spring arose on the garden fair, 
 Like the spirit of love felt everywhere. 
 And each flower and herb on earth's dark breast, 
 Rose from the dreams of its wintry rest. 
 
 The snow-drop, and then the violet 
 Arose from the ground with warm rain wet, 
 And their breath was mixed with fresh odour sent 
 From the turf, like the voice and the instrument. 
 
 Then the pied wind-flowers, and the tulip tall, 
 And narcissi, the fairest among them all, 
 Who gaze on their eyes in the stream's recess, 
 Till they die of their own dear loveliness ; 
 
 And the Naiad-like lily of the vale, 
 Whom youth makes so fair, and passion so pale, 
 That the light of its tremulous bells is seen 
 Through their pavilions of tender green ; 
 
 And the hyacinth purple, and white, and blue, 
 Which flung from its bells a sweet peal anew 
 Of music so delicate, soft, and intense, 
 It was felt like an odour within the sense ; 
 
 And the rose, like a nymph to the bath addrest, 
 Which unveiled the depth of her glowing breast, 
 Till, fold after fold, to the fainting air 
 The soul of her beauty and love lay bare ; 
 
 3. Midsummer -Night's Dream. 4. Shelley, The Sensi- 
 tive Plant. 
 
FLOWERS. I49 
 
 And the wand-like lily, which lifted up, 
 As a Mcenad, its moonlight coloured cup, 
 Till the fiery star, which is its eye, 
 Gazed through clear dew on the tender sky ; 
 
 And the jessamine faint, and the sweet tuberose, 
 The sweetest flower for scent that blows ; 
 And all rare blossoms, from every clime, 
 Grew in that garden in perfect prime. 
 
 5. So from the root 
 
 Springs lighter the green stalk, from thence the leaves 
 More airy, last the bright consummate flower 
 Spirits odorous breathes. 
 
 6. Ye field flowers ! the gardens eclipse you 'tis true, 
 Yet, wildings of Nature, I dote upon you, 
 
 For ye waft me the summers of old, 
 When the earth teemed around me with fairy delight, 
 And when daisies and buttercups gladdened my sight, 
 
 Like treasures of silver and gold. 
 
 Violet. — 
 
 7. A violet by a mossy stone 
 
 Half hidden from the eye ! 
 — Fair as a star, when only one 
 Is shining in the sky. 
 
 Celandine. — 
 
 8. There is a flower, the Lesser Celandine, 
 
 That shrinks like many more from cold and rain, 
 
 And the first moment that the sun may shine, 
 
 Bright as the sun himself, 'tis out again ! 
 
 When hailstones have been falling, swarm on swarm, 
 
 Or blasts the green field and the trees distrest, 
 
 Oft have I seen it muffled up from harm 
 
 In close self-shelter, like a thing at rest. 
 
 But lately, one rough day, this flower I past, 
 
 And recognized it, though an alter'd form, 
 
 Now standing forth an offering to the blast, 
 
 And buffeted at will by rain and storm. 
 
 Daisy, &c. — 
 
 9. Thou unassuming common-place 
 Of Nature, with that homely face, 
 And yet with something of a grace, 
 
 Which love makes for thee ! 
 
 5. Paradise Lost, b. 5. 6. Campbell's Wild Flowers. 
 7. Wordsworth's Poems. 8. Ibid. The Lesser Celandine. 
 9. Ibid. To the Daisy. 
 
1 5 O N ATU RE-STUDY. 
 
 Sweet flower ! for by that name at last, 
 When all my reveries are past, 
 I call thee, and to that cleave fast, 
 Sweet silent creature ! 
 10. Here at my feet what wonders pass, 
 What endless, active life is here ! 
 What blowing daisies, fragrant grass ! 
 An air-stirr'd forest, fresh and clear. 
 
 After a careful perusal of the foregoing selec- 
 tion of varied descriptions of objects composing 
 the world of realities around us, we may well 
 exclaim with Thomson : — 
 
 O Nature, all-sufficient, over all ! 
 Enrich me with the knowledge of thy works : 
 Snatch me to heaven ; thy rolling wonders there, 
 World beyond world, in infinite extent 
 Profusely scattered o'er the blue immense, 
 Show me ; their motions, periods, and their laws, 
 Give me to scan ; through the disclosing deep 
 Light my blind way ; the mineral strata there ; 
 Thrust, blooming, thence the vegetable world ; 
 O'er that the rising system, more complex, 
 Of animals ; and higher still, the mind, 
 The varied scene of quick-compounded thought, 
 And where the mixing passions endless shift : 
 These ever open to my ravished eye ; 
 A search, the flight of time can ne'er exhaust. 
 
 The field of investigation that lies before us 
 is indeed wide and fertile ; and active labourers 
 in it, as we have just seen, have not been want- 
 ing. What have they not found or developed 
 for our instruction, our pleasure and entertainment? 
 Can art, or science, or the general tide of human 
 progress, be in any way brought to bear on the 
 poet's terrestrial labours and celestial flights ; can 
 they furnish any new light to guide his steps, 
 or to enlarge his vision ? We have heard it 
 asserted that Poetry cannot be written on the 
 
 10. Arnold's Poems; Lines, Kensington Gardens. 
 
NATURE AND ART. 15I 
 
 rules of geometry, and we are firmly convinced 
 that such is the fact. In the famous controversy 
 regarding the invariable principles of Poetry, 
 Bowles maintained, says Moir — c that images 
 drawn from the sublime and beautiful in Nature 
 are more poetical than any drawn from art ; and 
 that the passions and aspirations of man's heart 
 belong to a higher class of associations than those 
 derived from incidental and transient manners.' 
 Moir considers — ' that the very exactness of 
 knowledge is a barrier to the laying on of that 
 colouring by which alone facts can be invested 
 with the illusive hues of poetry. The proof of 
 this (he suggests) would be obtained by a refer- 
 ence to what has been generally regarded as the 
 best poetry of the best authors in ancient and 
 modern times.' And he concludes that — ' turn- 
 ing to the world of mind it will be at once 
 apparent that the precision of science, as shown 
 in geographical limits, and in the recognized laws 
 of matter, would at once annul the grandest por- 
 tions of the Psalms, of Isaiah, Ezekiel, Job, and 
 the Revelation. It would convert the mythology 
 of Hesiod and Homer into rhapsodies ; and many 
 of the poems of Spenser, Shakspeare, Milton, 
 Gray, Coleridge, Southey, Wordsworth, Wilson, 
 Hogg, and Shelley, — in fact ail imaginative 
 verse — into tissues of rant and bombast.' But 
 Moir seems to have been needlessly overpowered 
 with an imaginary impression, for he goes far to 
 prove that history, war, civil commotion, and all 
 the terrors of fire and flood, are best treated by 
 the poet who should have the most meagre ac- 
 quaintance with law, politics, and military and 
 
152 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 naval tactics. He would seem to condemn even 
 a too exact knowledge of Geography ; and would 
 persuade us that it would be impossible for a 
 learned modern senator to translate Homer's 
 Iliad ; or for another to pen poetry, novels, and 
 romances. But the fact is that neither authors 
 nor the public can be injuriously affected by the 
 extension of technical education ; and much less 
 can it blight that lofty and next to divine pro- 
 vince which is sacred to the true poet. We 
 shall make it clear however, that poetry is an 
 Art depending on art, and independent of any 
 direct operation of science ; and that although 
 public enlightenment may seem to demand from 
 the poet a higher exercise of his genius, it is at 
 the same time quite within his power to meet 
 such a public claim on his fancy and imagination, 
 in so far at least as wide Nature is concerned, 
 on principles which accord with ancient and 
 present usage ; but are now made more apparent 
 than heretofore to common observation, and are 
 so exemplified as to open to view a new country, 
 as it were, with unexplored regions, abounding 
 in all that imagination can conceive, or the heart 
 desire. 
 
( *53 ) 
 
 Chapter VI. 
 
 Descriptive poetry in its second division, or large and or- 
 dinary sense ; Greek and other early poetry not highly 
 descriptive ; Blackmore's Creation ; Thomson's Seasons; 
 Darwin's botanical poetry ; Burns as a descriptive poet ; 
 characteristics of natural scenes, seasons, &c, in illus- 
 trative selections from the poets. 
 
 In the preceding Chapter we have presented a 
 copious selection of passages in which single 
 natural objects form the theme of descriptive 
 poetry. In the present Chapter, which has re- 
 ference to a wider range of poetical descriptions 
 of natural objects, a smaller number of examples 
 will suffice. 
 
 It has been well observed that the first 
 developments of Greek poetry were immediately 
 connected with religion, which amongst the 
 Greeks meant the worship of Nature ; and that 
 in a land, of which the climate was genial, and 
 the country beautiful. Ampiere observes : — 
 
 So magnificent are the effects of light, that 
 even Homer has not attempted to paint a sunrise 
 or a sunset; having substituted metaphor for 
 details. He has spoken of Aurora, to distract 
 attention, so that we omit to observe that he has 
 never described Aurora herself. The Homeric 
 poems, dating eight or nine centuries before 
 Christ, were composed in an unlettered age, when 
 human passion was the actuating principle of 
 
154 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 life, and the face of Nature the only book open 
 to mankind.* 
 
 Humboldt notices in his Cosmos that a pro- 
 found feeling of Nature pervades the most 
 ancient poetry of the Hebrews and Indians ; 
 and exists, therefore, amongst nations of very 
 different descent — Semetic and Indio-Germanic. 
 He asserts that, excepting human nature, the 
 descriptions of external nature in its manifold 
 richness of form, as a distinct branch of poetic 
 literature, was wholly unknown to the Greeks. 
 
 Sir Richard Blackmore's poem entitled Crea- 
 tion^ which appeared in 1700, and which is re- 
 commended by Addison in his Spectator, No. 
 339, being philosophical rather than descriptive, 
 was principally designed to prove the existence 
 of God from the evident wisdom, design, con- 
 trivance, and choice of ends and means displayed 
 in the Universe ; and arguments are offered in 
 refutation of the philosophical theories of 
 atomists and fatalists ; and prevalent atheistical 
 doctrines ; he, therefore, invokes Divine assist- 
 ance : — 
 
 That I may reach th' Almighty's sacred throne, 
 And make His ceaseless pow'r, the cause of all things, 
 known. 
 
 Such being its author's chief concern, the 
 Creation is without picturesqueness in descrip- 
 tion, even where it would have been appropriate 
 and certainly an embellishment. The earth, the 
 solar system, man, epicurean and other views of 
 
 * History of Classical Literature. By R. W. Browne, 
 M.A., 2 vols. 8vo. — Poets of Ancient Greece. By H. Allford, 
 M.A. 8vo., 1841. 
 
DESCRIPTIVE POETRY. 1 55 
 
 creation, the vicissitude of human affairs, Greek 
 and other fables, human reason and faculties, 
 lead only to interminable philosophical discussion ; 
 without that relief of imagery with which a 
 more imaginative poet would have adorned a 
 didactic poem of such length and importance. 
 
 The most considerable descriptive poem of 
 modern times is The Seasons, by Thomson, 
 completed in 1730. Dr. Aikin who wrote an 
 essay on the work, observes : ' Natural history, 
 in its most extensive signification, includes every 
 observation relative to the distinctions, resem- 
 blances, and changes, of all the bodies, both 
 animate and inanimate, which Nature offers to 
 us.' And, alluding to an essay which we have 
 already noticed,* remarks that it was intended 
 ' to show how necessary a more accurate and 
 scientific survey of natural objects than has 
 usually been taken, was to the avoiding of the 
 common defects, and attaining the highest 
 beauties, of descriptive poetry. 5 He speaks of 
 the poem itself as the original whence our 
 modern descriptive poets have derived that more 
 elegant and correct style of painting natural 
 objects which distinguishes them from their 
 predecessors. 
 
 The Botanic Garden, by Dr. E. Darwin, 
 which first appeared in 1781, is a singular 
 attempt to wed science to poetry, affording con- 
 vincing proofs how hopeless it is to attempt the 
 production of a botanical or any other scientific 
 treatise in a poetical form. It consists of two 
 parts, 1 st. The economy of vegetation; and 
 
 * See page 15. 
 
1 5 6 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 2nd, The loves of the plants. A perusal of the 
 following Argument of the first Canto will 
 suffice to show the unsatisfactory character of 
 the work : — 
 
 The Genius of the place invites the Goddess of Botany. — 
 She descends, is received by Spring, and the Elements — 
 Addresses the Nymphs of Fire — Star-light Night seen in 
 the Camera Obscura.-«*-Love created the Universe — Chaos 
 explodes — All the stars revolve. — Shooting stars — Light- 
 ning — Rainbow — Colours of the Morning and Evening- 
 Skies — Exterior atmosphere of inflammable Air — Twilight 
 — Fire-balls — Aurora Borealis — Planets — Comets — Fixed 
 Stars — Sun's Orb. — Fires at the Earth's Centre — Animal 
 incubation — Volcanic Mountains — Venus visits the Cyclops. 
 — Heat confined on the Earth by the Air — Phosphoric 
 lights in the evening — Bolognian Stone — Calcined Shells 
 — Memnon's Harp — Ignis fatuus — Luminous flowers — 
 Glow-worm — Fire-fly — Luminous Sea-insects — Electric 
 Eel — Eagle armed with lightnings — Discovery of Fire — 
 Medusa — Phosphorus — Lady in Love — Gunpowder — Steam- 
 engine applied to pumps, bellows, water-engines, &c. — La- 
 bours of Hercules — Abyla and Calpe. — Electric Machine — 
 Hesperian Dragon — Electric Kiss — Halo round the heads 
 of Saints — Electric shock — Fairy rings, &c, &c. — The 
 great Egg of Night — Western wind unfettered — Naiad 
 released — Frost assailed — Whale attacked. — Buds and 
 flowers expanded by warmth, &c. — Sirius — Jupiter and 
 Semele — Northern Constellations — Ice Islands — Rainy 
 Monsoons — Elijah on Mount Carmel — Departure of the 
 Nymphs of fire like sparks from artificial fireworks. 
 
 But with all its eccentricities a selection might 
 be made of some pleasing passages, such as, for 
 instance : — 
 
 From giant Oaks, that wave their branches dark, 
 To the dwarf moss that clings upon their bark. 
 
 Or, the mystical picture of vegetable love : — 
 
 Now Snowdrops cold, and blue-eyed Harebells blend 
 Their tender tears, as o'er the stream they bend ; 
 The love-sick Violet, and the Primrose pale, 
 Bow their sweet heads, and whisper to the gale ; 
 With secret sighs the Virgin Lily droops, 
 And jealous Cowslips hang their tawny cups. 
 
DESCRIPTION. I57 
 
 Now the young Rose in beauty's damask pride 
 Drinks the warm blushes of his bashful bride ; 
 With honey'd lips enamour'd Woodbines meet, 
 Clasp with fond arms, and mix their kisses sweet. 
 
 Some remarks that recently appeared in a 
 critique on Richardson's Novels, apply to most 
 of the prose and poetry of his time, in respect 
 to the decided apathy shown to any influences 
 of Nature. The novelist presents one of his 
 characters passing the Alps, and the only descrip- 
 tion given relates to the horrible dangers of 
 Mont Cenis, to the effect that ' every object 
 which here presents itself is excessively miser- 
 able ; ' and ' a spacious park,' or ' a fine prospect,' 
 are as coldly alluded to as if they were so much 
 furniture for a ' large and convenient country 
 house.' 
 
 Throughout Burns's poetry we find many 
 exquisite sketches of seasons and scenery, but 
 more in connection with the subject of his verse, 
 than for description by themselves, and never at 
 any length. It would almost appear from senti- 
 ments expressed in The Vision that he did not 
 feel himself competent to become a rival of other 
 bards in that particular department of poesy 
 when he modestly says : — 
 
 Thou canst not learn, nor can I show, 
 To paint with Thomson's landscape glow ; 
 Or wake the bosom-melting throe, 
 
 With Shenstone's art ; 
 Or pour, with Gray, the moving flow 
 
 Warm on the heart. 
 
 Yet, all beneath the unrivall'd rose, 
 
 The lowly daisy sweetly blows ; 
 
 Tho' large the forest's monarch throws 
 
 His army shade, 
 Yet green the juicy hawthorn grows, 
 
 Adown the glade. 
 
I58 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 But whoever can read and enjoy his c wood- 
 notes wild ' must feel persuaded that the author 
 of The Brigs of Ayr, Tarn O'Sbanter, A 
 Wifiter Night, Epistles, Verses, and many others, 
 had it served his purpose, might have left us 
 pieces surpassing even those of Thomson, Gray, 
 or Shenstone. He could not have written : — 
 
 Heavens ! what a goodly prospect spreads around, 
 Of hills, and dales, and woods, and lawns, and spires, 
 And glittering towns, and gilded streams, till all 
 The stretching landscape into smoke decays ! 
 
 Such we find in Thomson's Summer; but never 
 any lines so weak and diffuse occur in the short 
 descriptive pieces by Burns, in which everything 
 seems more or less to have being, and to live 
 and move : — 
 
 Here, rivers in the sea were lost ; 
 There, mountains to the skies were tost : 
 Here, tumbling billows mark'd the coast 
 With surging foam. 
 
 Of the following illustrative specimens, some 
 are imaginative, and others drawn direct from 
 natural scenery. Where generalization takes the 
 place of detail the picture becomes propor- 
 tionably sketchy, as in some of Milton's descrip- 
 tions ; but draughts from Nature itself indicate 
 their origin by unmistakeable touches of cha- 
 racter : — 
 
 Mountain Scenery. — 
 
 1. It was a mountain at whose verdant feet 
 A spacious plain outstretch'd in circuit wide 
 Lay pleasant ; from his side two rivers flow'd, 
 Th' one winding, th' other straight, and left between 
 Fair champain with less rivers intervein'd, 
 Then meeting join'd their tribute to the sea : 
 
 1. Paradise Regained, b. iii. 
 
MOUNTAIN SCENERY. 1 59 
 
 Fertile of corn the glebe, of oil and wine ; 
 
 With herds the pastures throng'd, with flocks the hills, 
 
 >;; * # * * 
 
 here and there was room 
 
 For barren desert, fountainless and dry. 
 
 2. The western side 
 
 Of that high mountain, whence he might behold 
 
 Another plain, long, but in breadth not wide, 
 
 Wash'd by the southern sea, and on the north 
 
 To equal length back'd with a ridge of hills, 
 
 That screen'd the fruits of the earth and seats of men 
 
 From old Septentnon blasts, thence in the midst 
 
 Divided by a river, 
 
 * ■& * 
 
 Gardens, and groves- ■ 
 
 Above the height of mountains interpos'd : 
 
 3. Green fields, and glowing rock, and glancing streamlet, 
 all slope together in the sunshine towards the brows of 
 ravines, where the pines take up their own dominion of 
 saddened shade : and with everlasting roar in the twi- 
 light, the stronger torrents thunder down, pale from the 
 glaciers, filling all their chasms with enchanted cold, 
 beating themselves to pieces against the great rocks 
 that they have themselves cast down, and forcing fierce 
 way beneath their ghastly poise. 
 
 The mountain paths slope to these glens in forky 
 zigzags, leading to some grey and narrow arch, all 
 fringed under its shuddering curve with the ferns that 
 fear the light ; 
 
 4. [Mr. Ruskin, in allusion to the mountain gloom in the 
 neighbourhood of the valley of the Rhone, says : — ] I 
 do not know that there is a district in the world more 
 calculated to illustrate the power of the expectant 
 imagination than that which surrounds the city of 
 Fribourg in Switzerland, extending from it towards 
 Berne. It is of grey sandstone, considerably elevated, 
 but presenting no object of striking interest to the 
 passing traveller; so that, as it is generally seen in 
 the course of a hasty journey from the Bernese Alps 
 to those of Savoy, it is rarely regarded with any other 
 sensation than that of weariness, all the more painful 
 because accompanied with reaction from the high excite- 
 ment caused by the splendour of the Bernese Oberland. 
 The traveller, footsore, feverish, and satiated with 
 
 2. Paradise Regained, b. iv. 3. Ruskin's Modern 
 Painters, vol. i. 1846. 4. Ibid. vol. iv. 1856. 
 
1 60 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 glacier and precipice, his back in the corner of the 
 diligence, perceiving little more than that the road is 
 winding and hilly, and the country through which it 
 passes cultivated, and tame. Let him, however, only 
 do this tame country the justice of staying in it a few 
 days, until his mind has recovered its tone, and take 
 one or two long walks through its fields, and he will 
 have other thoughts of it. It is an undulating district 
 of grey sandstone, never attaining any considerable 
 height, but having enough of the mountain spirit to 
 throw itself into continual succession of bold slope and 
 dale ; elevated, also, just far enough above the sea to 
 render the pine a frequent forest tree along its irregular 
 ridges. Through this elevated tract the river cuts its 
 way in a ravine some five or six hundred feet in depth, 
 which winds for leagues between the gentle hills, 
 unthought of, until its edge is approached ; and then 
 suddenly, through the boughs of the firs, the eye per- 
 ceives, beneath, the green and gliding stream, and the 
 broad walls of sandstone cliff that form its banks ; 
 hollowed out where the river leans against them, as it 
 turns, into perilous overhanging, and, on the other 
 shore, at the same spots, leaving little breadths of 
 meadow between them and the water, half-overgrown 
 with thicket, deserted in their sweetness, inaccessible 
 from above, and rarely visited by any curious wan- 
 derers along the hardly traceable footpath which 
 struggles for existence beneath the rocks. And there 
 the river ripples, and eddies, and murmurs in an utter 
 solitude. It is passing through the midst of a thickly 
 peopled country ; but never was a stream so lonely. 
 The feeblest and most far-away torrent among the 
 high hills has its companions : the goats browse beside 
 it ; and the traveller drinks from it, aad passes over it 
 with his staff; and the peasant traces a new channel 
 for it down to his mill-wheel. But this stream has no 
 companions : it flows on in an infinite seclusion, not 
 secret nor threatening, but a quietness of sweet day- 
 light and open air, — a broad space of tender and deep 
 desolateness, drooped into repose out of the midst of 
 human labour and life ; the waves plashing lowly, 
 with none to hear them ; and the wild birds building 
 in the boughs, with none to fray them away ; and the 
 soft, fragrant herbs rising, and breathing, and fading, 
 with no hand to gather them ; — and yet all bright and 
 bare to the clouds above, and to the fresh fall of the 
 passing sunshine and pure rain.' 
 
MOUNTAIN SCENERY, ETC. l6l 
 
 5. [On the beauty of mountains the same writer ob- 
 serves : — ] The best image which the world can give of 
 Paradise is in the slope of the meadows, orchards, and 
 corn-fields on the sides of a great Alp, with its purple 
 rocks and eternal snows above ; this excellence not 
 being in anywise a matter referable to feeling, or indi- 
 vidual preferences, but demonstrable by calm enumera- 
 tion of the number of lovely colours on the rocks, the 
 varied grouping of the trees, and quantity of noble 
 incidents in stream, crag, or cloud, presented to the 
 eye at any given moment, * * * among moun- 
 tains, large unbroken spaces of pure violet and 
 purple are introduced in their distances ; and even 
 near, by films of cloud passing over the darkness of 
 ravines or forests, blues are produced of the most 
 subtle tenderness ; these azures and purples passing 
 into rose-colour of otherwise wholly unattainable deli- 
 cacy among the upper summits, the blue of the sky being 
 at the same time purer and deeper than in the plains. 
 
 Naples. — 
 
 6. The sun is warm, the sky is clear, 
 The waves are dancing fast and bright, 
 Blue isles and snowy mountains wear 
 The purple noon's transparent light : 
 The breath of the moist air is light 
 Around its unexpanded buds ; 
 
 Like many a voice of one delight — 
 The winds', the birds', the ocean-floods' — 
 The City's voice itself is soft like Solitude's. 
 
 I see the Deep's untrampled floor 
 With green and purple sea-weeds strown ; 
 I see the waves upon the shore 
 Like light dissolved in star-showers thrown : 
 I sit upon the sands alone ; 
 The lightning of the noon-tide ocean 
 Is flashing round me, and a tone 
 Arises from its measured motion — 
 How sweet ! did any heart now share in my emotion. 
 
 Italy. — 
 
 7. Far to the right, where Apennine ascends, 
 
 Bright as the summer, Italy extends ; 
 Its uplands sloping deck the mountain's side, 
 Woods over woods in gay theatric pride, 
 
 5. Modem Painters, vol. iv. 1856. 6. Shelley's Poems, 
 Naples. 7. Goldsmith, The Traveller. 
 
 M 
 
1 6 2 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Could Nature's bounty satisfy the breast, 
 The sons of Italy were surely blest. 
 Whatever fruits in different climes are found, 
 That proudly rise, or humbly court the ground- 
 Whatever blooms in torrid tracts appear, 
 Whose bright succession decks the varied year- 
 Whatever sweets salute the northern sky 
 With vernal lives, that blossom but to die — 
 These here disporting own the kindred soil, 
 Nor ask luxuriance from the planter's toil ; 
 While sea-born gales their gelid wings expand 
 
 To winnow fragrance round the smiling land. 
 * * # # 
 
 In florid beauty groves and fields appear. 
 Etna, &c. — 
 
 8. The mules, I think, will not be here this hour. 
 They feel the cool wet turf under their feet 
 By the stream side, after the dusty lanes 
 In which they have toiled all night from Catana, 
 And scarcely will they budge a yard. . O Pan ! 
 How gracious is the mountain at this hour ! 
 
 [The harper Callicles sings. The scene described.] 
 
 The track winds down to the clear stream 
 
 To cross the sparkling shallows ; there 
 
 The cattle love to gather, on their way 
 
 To the high mountain pastures, and to stay, 
 
 Till the rough cow-herds drive them past, 
 
 Knee-deep in the cool ford ; for 'tis the last 
 
 Of all the woody, high, well-water'd dells 
 
 On Etna ; and the beam 
 
 Of noon is broken there by chesnut boughs 
 
 Down its steep verdant sides ; the air 
 
 Is freshen'd by the leaping stream, which throws 
 
 Eternal showers of spray on the moss'd roots 
 
 Of trees, and veins of turf, and long dark shoots 
 
 Of ivy-plants, and fragrant hanging bells 
 
 Of hyacinths, and on late anemones, 
 
 That muffle its wet banks ; but glade, 
 
 And stream, and sward, and chesnut trees, 
 
 End here ; Etna beyond, in the broad glare 
 
 Of the hot noon, without a shade, 
 
 Slope behind slope, up to the peak, lies bare; 
 
 The peak, round which the white clouds play. 
 
 8. M. Arnold's New Poems, 1867; Empedocles on Etna. 
 
ETNA, ETC. 163 
 
 * * the sun 
 
 Is shining on the brilliant mountain crests, 
 And on the highest pines ; but further down 
 Here in the valley is in shade ; the sward 
 Is dark, and on the stream the mist still hangs ; 
 One sees one's footprints crush'd in the wet grass, 
 One's breath curls in the air ; and on these pines 
 That climb from the stream's edge, the long grey tufts, 
 Which the goats love, are jewell'd thick with dew. 
 
 9. Hazy Scene. — 
 
 'Twas summer, and the sun had mounted high : 
 Southward the landscape indistinctly glared 
 Through a pale steam ; but all the northern downs, 
 In clearest air ascending, showed far off 
 A surface dappled o'er with shadows flung 
 From many a brooding cloud, far as the sight 
 Could reach, those many shadows lay in spots 
 Determined and unmoved, with steady beams 
 Of bright and pleasant sunshine interposed ; 
 . Pleasant to him who on the soft cool moss 
 Extends his careless limbs along the front 
 Of some huge cave, whose rocky ceiling casts 
 A twilight of its own, an ample shade, 
 Where the wren warbles, while the dreaming man, 
 Half conscious of the soothing melody, 
 With sidelong eye looks out upon the scene, 
 By that impending covert made more soft, 
 More low and distant ! 
 
 A woody Dell. — 
 
 1. More dark 
 
 And dark the shades accumulate — the oak, 
 
 Expanding its immense and knotty arms 
 
 Embraces the light beech. The pyramids 
 
 Of the tall cedar over-arching, frame 
 
 Most solemn domes within, and far below, 
 
 Like clouds suspended in an emerald sky, 
 
 The ash and the acacia floating hang 
 
 Tremulous and pale. Like restless serpents, clothed 
 
 In rainbow and in fire, the parasites, 
 
 Starred with ten thousand blossoms, flow around 
 
 The gray trunks ; and, as gamesome infant's eyes, 
 
 With gentle meanings, and midst innocent wiles, 
 
 Fold their beams round the hearts of those that love, 
 
 These twine their tendrils with the wedded boughs 
 
 Uniting their close union ; the woven leaves 
 
 9. The Excursion. 1. Shelley's Alastor. 
 
 M 2 
 
164 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Make net-work of the dark blue light of day, 
 And the night's noontide clearness, mutable 
 As shapes in the weird clouds. Soft mossy lawns 
 Beneath these canopies extend their swells, 
 Fragrant with perfumed herbs, and eyed with blooms 
 Minute yet beautiful. One darkest glen 
 Sends from its woods of musk-rose, twined with jas- 
 mine, 
 A soul-dissolving odour, to invite 
 To some more lovely mystery. Through the dell, 
 Silence and Twilight here, twin-sisters, keep 
 Their noon-day watch, and sail among the shades, 
 Like vaporous shapes half-seen ; beyond, a well, 
 Dark, gleaming, and of most translucent wave, 
 Images all the woven boughs above, 
 And each depending leaf, and every speck 
 Of azure sky, darting between their chasms ; 
 Nor aught else in the liquid mirror laves 
 Its portraiture, but some inconstant star 
 Between one foliaged lattice twinkling fair, 
 Or painted bird, sleeping beneath the moon, 
 Or gorgeous insect, floating motionless, 
 Unconscious of the day, ere yet his wings 
 Have spread their glories to the gaze of noon. 
 
 A calm Scene. — 
 
 2. The sun's bright orb, declining all serene, 
 
 Now glanced obliquely o'er the woodland scene. 
 Creation smiles around ; on every spray 
 The warbling birds exalt their evening lay. 
 Blithe skipping o'er yon hill, the fleecy train 
 Join the deep chorus of the lowing plain : 
 The golden lime and orange there were seen, 
 On fragrant branches of perpetual green. 
 The crystal streams, that velvet meadows lave, 
 To the green ocean roll with chiding wave. 
 The glassy ocean hush'd forgets to roar, 
 But trembling murmurs on the sandy shore : 
 And lo ! his surface, lovely to behold ! 
 Glows in the west, a sea of living gold ! 
 While, all above, a thousand liveries gay 
 The skies with pomp ineffable array. 
 Arabian sweets perfume the happy plains : 
 Above, beneath, around enchantment reigns ! 
 While yet the shades, on time's eternal scale, 
 With long vibration deepen o'er the vale ; 
 
 2. W. Falconer, The Shipwreck. 
 
CALM SCENE. 1 65 
 
 While yet the songsters of the vocal grove 
 With dying numbers tune the soul to love ; 
 With joyful eyes th' attentive master sees 
 
 Th' auspicious omens of an eastern breeze. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Deep midnight now involves the livid skies, 
 While infant breezes from the shore arise. 
 The waning moon, behind a wat'ry shroud, 
 Pale-glimmer'd o'er the long-protracted cloud. 
 A mighty ring around her silver throne, 
 With parting meteors cross'd portentous shone. 
 This in the troubled sky full oft prevails ; 
 Oft deem'd a signal of tempestuous gales. 
 
 From east to north the transient breezes play ; 
 And in the Egyptian quarter soon decay. 
 
 ^ * ^C ijC 
 
 Now morn, her lamp pale glimmering on the sight, 
 Scatter'd before her van reluctant night, 
 She comes not in refulgent pomp array'd, 
 But sternly frowning, wrapt in sullen shade. 
 Above incumbent vapours, Ida's height, 
 Tremendous rock ! emerges on the sight. 
 North-east the guardian isle of Standia lies, 
 And westward Freschin's woody capes arise. 
 * * * * 
 
 Evening. — 
 3. The sultry summer day is done. 
 The western hills have hid the sun, 
 But mountain peak and village spire 
 Retain reflection of his fire. 
 Old Barnard's towers are purple still, 
 To those that gaze from Toller-hill ; 
 Distant and high, the tower of Bowes 
 Like steel upon the anvil glows ; 
 And Stanmore's ridge, behind that lay, 
 Rich with the spoils of parting day, 
 In crimson and in gold array'd, 
 Streaks yet awhile the closing shade, 
 Then slow resigns to darkening heaven 
 The tints which brighter hours had given. 
 
 The eve, that slow on upland fades, 
 Has darker closed on Rokeby's glades, 
 
 3. Scott's Rokeby, c. v. 
 
1 66 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Where, sunk within their banks profound, 
 Her guardian streams to meeting wound. 
 The stately oaks, whose sombre frown 
 Of noontide made a twilight brown, 
 Impervious now to fainter light, 
 Of twilight make an early night. 
 Hoarse into middle air arose 
 The vespers of the roosting crows, 
 And with congenial murmurs seem 
 To wake the Genii of the stream ; 
 For louder clamour'd Greta's tide, 
 And Tees in deeper voice replied. 
 And fitful waked the evening wind, 
 Fitful in sighs its breath resign'd. 
 
 Lake Scene. — 
 
 4. The summer dawn's reflected hue 
 
 To purple changed Loch Katrine blue ; 
 
 Mildly and soft the western breeze 
 
 Just kiss'd the lake, just stirr'd the trees ; 
 
 And the pleased lake, like the maiden coy, 
 
 Trembled but dimpled not for joy; 
 
 The mountain-shadows on her breast 
 
 Were neither broken nor at rest ; 
 
 In bright uncertainty they lie, 
 
 Like future joys in Fancy's eye. 
 
 The water-lily to the light 
 
 Her chalice rear'd of silver bright ; 
 
 The doe awake, and to the lawn, 
 
 Begemm'd with dewdrops, led her fawn ; 
 
 The grey mist left the mountain side, 
 
 The torrent show'd its glistening pride ; 
 
 Invisible in flecked sky, 
 
 The lark sent down her revelry ; 
 
 The blackbird and the speckled thrush 
 
 Good-morrow gave from brake and bush ; 
 
 In answer coo'd the cushat dove 
 
 Her notes of peace, and rest, and love. 
 
 Rustic Scene. — 
 
 5. On either side the river lie 
 Long fields of barley and of rye, 
 
 That clothe the wold and meet the sky ; 
 And thro' the field the road runs by 
 
 To many-tower'd Camelot ; 
 And up and down the people go, 
 
 4. Scott's Lady of the Lake, c. iii. 5. Tennyson's Lady of 
 Shalott. 
 
RUSTIC SCENE. 1 67 
 
 Gazing where the lilies blow 
 Round an island there below, 
 
 The island of Shalott. 
 Willows whiten, aspens quiver, 
 Little breezes dusk and shiver 
 Thro' the wave that runs for ever 
 By the island in the river 
 
 Flowing down to Camelot. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Overlook a space of flowers, 
 And the silent isle imbowers 
 
 The Lady of Shalott. 
 
 Sterile Scene. — 
 
 6. No matter what the sketch might be ; 
 Whether the high field on the bushless Pike, 
 Or even a sand-built ridge 
 
 Of heaped hills that mound the sea, 
 
 Overblown with murmurs harsh, 
 
 Or even a lowly cottage whence we see 
 
 Stretch'd wide and wild the waste enormous marsh, 
 
 Where from the frequent bridge, 
 
 Like emblems of infinity, 
 
 The trenched waters run from sky to sky; 
 
 Moorland. — 
 
 7. 'Tis the place, and all around it, as of old, the 
 
 curlews call, 
 Dreary gleams about the moorland flying over 
 
 Locksley Hall ; 
 Locksley Hall, that half in ruin overlooks the sandy 
 
 tracts, 
 And the hollow ocean-ridges roaring into cataracts. 
 
 * * ^ >!' 
 
 great Orion sloping slowly to the West. 
 
 Many a night I saw the Pleiads, rising thro' the 
 
 mellow shade, 
 Glitter like a swarm of fire-flies tangled in a silver 
 braid. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 In the Spring a fuller crimson comes upon the 
 
 robin's breast ; 
 In the Spring the wanton ^lapwing gets himself 
 
 another crest ; 
 In the Spring a livelier iris changes on the burnish'd 
 
 dove. 
 
 6. Tennyson's Ode to Memory. 7. Ibid. Locksley Hall. 
 
J 6 8 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Spring Morning. — 
 
 8. How beauteous, how lovely, is ev'rything here ! 
 The sun on the hill-side, the shade on the weir ; 
 Where through the bright crystal the fishes are seen, 
 Where wave o'er the water the alder-trees green. 
 
 How glow the bright meadows with young verdure 
 
 new ! 
 How fresh bloom the flow' rets bespangled with dew ! 
 The berry already is blushing in red ; 
 The wheat-ear is smiling with promise of bread. 
 
 The slender birch waves in the whispering grove ; 
 The blackberry twineth the rockstone above ; 
 The honey-bee hums as he swiftly speeds on ; 
 The frog's voice is drowned in the lark r s sweeter tone. 
 
 How beauteous, how lovely do all things appear! 
 The waterfall's murmur, the shade on the weir. 
 On all sides around us pure joys are unfurled, 
 To light with their radiance our path through the 
 world. 
 
 Spring.— 
 
 g. And see where surly Winter passes off, 
 
 Far to the north, and calls his ruffian blasts; 
 His blasts obey, and quit the howling hill, 
 The shattered forest, and the ravaged vale ; 
 While softer gales succeed, at whose kind touch, 
 Dissolving snows in livid torrents lost, 
 The mountains lift their green heads to the sky. 
 
 The bittern knows his time, with bill ingulphed 
 To shake the sounding marsh ; or, from the shore, 
 The plovers when to scatter o'er the heath, 
 
 And sing their wild notes to the listening waste. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 In various hues ; but chiefly thee, gay green ! 
 
 Thou smiling Nature's universal robe ! 
 
 United light and shade ! where the sight dwells 
 
 With growing strength, and ever-new delight. 
 
 * * ■',< * 
 
 The hawthorn whitens, and the juicy groves 
 Put forth their buds, unfolding by degrees, 
 Till the whole leafy forest stands displayed, 
 In full luxuriance, to the sighing gales. 
 
 8. Dulcken's German Songs (W.G.Becker). 9. The Seasons. 
 
SPRING, SUMMER. 1 69 
 
 The garden glows, and fills the liberal air 
 With lavish fragrance ; while the promised fruit 
 Lies yet a little embryo, unperceived, 
 Within its crimson folds. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Moist, bright, and green, the landscape laughs 
 around. 
 Summer. — 
 
 1. But yonder comes the powerful king of day, 
 Rejoicing in the east. The lessening cloud, 
 The kindling azure, and the mountain's brow 
 Illumed with fluid gold, his near approach 
 Betoken glad. 
 
 * * # * 
 
 The very dead creation, from thy touch 
 Assumes a mimic life. By thee refined, 
 In brighter mazes the reluctant stream 
 Plays o'er the mead. The precipice abrupt, 
 Projecting horror on the blackened flood, 
 Softens at thy return. The Desert joys 
 
 Wildly, through all his melancholy bounds. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Half in a blush of clustering roses lost, 
 Dew-drooping Coolness to the shade retires ; 
 There, on the verdant turf, or flowery bed, 
 By gelid founts and careless rills to muse ; 
 While tyrant Heat, dispreading through the sky, 
 With rapid sway, his burning influence darts 
 On man, and beast, and herb, and tepid stream. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Say, shall we wind 
 
 Along the streams ? or walk the smiling mead ? 
 Or court the forest-glades ? or wander wild 
 Among the waving harvests ? or ascend, 
 While radiant Summer opens all its pride, 
 Thy hill, delightful Shene ?, 
 
 Autumn. — 
 
 2. Soon as the morning trembles o'er the sky, 
 And, unperceived, unfolds the spreading day ; 
 Before the ripened field the reapers stand, 
 
 In fair array ; 
 
 * * * * 
 
 When Autumn scatters his departing gleams, 
 Warned of approaching Winter, gathered, play 
 
 1,2. The Seasons. 
 
1 70 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 The swallow-people ; and tossed wide around, 
 O'er the calm sky, in convolution swift, 
 The feathered eddy floats : rejoicing once, 
 Ere to their wintry slumbers they retire ; 
 
 But see the fading many-coloured woods, 
 Shade deepening over shade, the country round 
 Imbrown ; a crowded umbrage, dusk and dun 
 Of every hue, from wan-declining green 
 To sooty dark. 
 
 * # * * 
 
 While congregated thrushes, linnets, larks, 
 And each wild throat whose artless strains so late 
 Swelled all the music of the swarming shades, 
 Robbed of their tuneful souls, now shivering sit 
 On the dead tree, a dull despondent flock ; 
 With not a brightness waving o'er their plumes, 
 And nought save chattering discord in their note. 
 
 # * * * 
 
 Fled is the blasted verdure of the fields ; 
 And, shrunk into their beds, the flowery race 
 Their sunny robes resign. 
 
 Winter. — 
 
 3. See, Winter comes, to rule the varied year, 
 Sullen and sad, with all his rising train ; 
 Vapours, and clouds, and storms. 
 
 * # * * 
 
 Hung o'er the farthest verge of heaven, the Sun 
 Scarce spreads through ether the dejected day. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 a blackening: train 
 
 Of clamorous rooks thick urge their weary flight, 
 And seek the closing shelter of the grove. 
 Assiduous, in his bower, the wailing owl 
 Plies his sad song. The cormorant on high 
 Wheels from the deep, and screams along the land. 
 Loud shrieks the soaring hern ; and with wild wing 
 The circling sea-fowl cleave the flaky clouds. 
 
 %: %. sj: s|! 
 
 Huge Uproar lords it wide. The clouds commixed 
 With stars swift-gliding, sweep along the sky. 
 
 All nature reels : 
 
 * * * * 
 
 . The cherished fields 
 
 Put on their winter-robe of purest white. 
 3. Thomson, The Seasons. 
 
WINTER, ETC. 171 
 
 'Tis brightness all ; 
 
 * * * * 
 
 'Tis done ! dread Winter spreads his latest glooms, 
 And reigns tremendous o'er the conquered year. 
 How dead the vegetable kingdom lies ! 
 How dumb the tuneful ! Horror wide extends 
 His desolate domain. 
 
 4. Oft have I seen a sudden storm arise, 
 
 From all the warring winds that sweep the skies 
 
 The heavy harvest from the root is torn, 
 
 And whirl'd aloft the lighter stubble borne : 
 
 With such a force the flying rack is driv'n, 
 
 And such a winter wears the face of heav'n. 
 
 And oft whole sheets descend of sluicy rain, 
 
 Suck'd by the spongy clouds from off the main : 
 
 The lofty skies at once come pouring down, 
 
 The promis'd crop and golden labours drown. 
 
 The dikes are fill'd ; and, with a roaring sound, 
 
 The rising rivers float the nether ground ; 
 
 And rocks the bellowing voice of boiling seas rebound. 
 
 * $z * * 
 
 When winter's rage abates, when cheerful hours 
 Awake the Spring, and Spring awakes the flow'rs, 
 
 * * * ■* 
 
 Above the rest, the sun, who never lies, 
 
 Foretels the change of weather in the skies : 
 
 * » * * 
 
 The sun reveals the secrets of the sky ; 
 And who dares give the source of light the lie ? 
 
 Evening. — 
 
 5. The Curfew tolls the knell of parting day, 
 
 The lowing herds wind slowly o'er the lea, 
 The ploughman homeward plods his weary way, 
 And leaves the world to darkness and to me. 
 
 Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight, 
 And all the air a solemn stillness holds, 
 
 Save where the beetle wheels his drony flight, 
 And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds : 
 
 Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tower, 
 The moping owl does to the moon complain 
 
 Of such as, wandering near her secret bower, 
 Molest her ancient solitary reign. 
 
 4. Dryden's Virgil's Georgics, G. i. 5. T. Gray's Elegy. 
 
I72 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade, 
 Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap, 
 
 Each in his narrow cell for ever laid, 
 
 The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep. 
 
 The breezy call of incense-breathing Morn, 
 
 The swallow twitt'ring from the straw-built shed, 
 
 The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn, 
 No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed. 
 
 6. The deep'ning shades o'erspread the golden west, 
 
 The mottled clouds sweep on before the breeze, 
 Rude Labour leaves his weary sons to rest, 
 And sea-like murmurs sound among the trees. 
 
 The muffled owl sails by on silent wing, 
 The drowsy moth pursues his dusky way, 
 
 Light-crested gnats their busy carols sing, 
 And closing flowrets mourn departing day. 
 
 Soft dews descending bathe the thirsty ground, 
 A mingled fragrance cheers the pensive night, 
 
 Dim rising vapours slowly roll around, 
 
 And wand'ring glow-worms shed their emerald 
 light. 
 
 Now breathe the high romantic love-lorn tale, 
 And mix ideal scenes of fairy bliss ; 
 
 Let airy harps from ev'ry passing gale 
 
 Steal heav'nly notes with soft enchanting kiss. 
 
 The mingled charm shall cheat my ardent soul ; 
 
 And, gleaming thro' the dim fantastic light, 
 Bright shadowy forms around my head shall roll, 
 
 And golden visions bless my ravish'd sight. 
 
 7. I stood on the mountain summit, 
 
 At the hour when the sun did set ; 
 I mark'd how it hung o'er the woodland 
 The evening's golden net. 
 
 And, with the dew descending, 
 
 A peace on earth there fell, — 
 
 And Nature lay hushed in quiet, 
 
 At the voice of the evening bell. 
 * * * * 
 
 — every flower is closing 
 
 In silence its little eye, — 
 And every wave in the brooklet 
 
 More softly murmureth by. 
 
 6. Miss Aikin, Evening. 7. F. Ruckert's Evening Song 
 (from Dulcken's German Songs). 
 
DESCRIPTIVE POETRY. 1 73 
 
 The weary caterpillar 
 
 Hath nestled beneath the weeds ; 
 All wet with dew now slumbers 
 
 The dragon-fly in the reeds. 
 
 The golden beetle hath laid him 
 
 In a rose-leaf cradle to rock ; 
 Now wend to their nightly shelter 
 
 The shepherd and his flock. 
 
 The lark from on high is seeking 
 
 In the moistened grass her nest, 
 The hart and the hind have laid them 
 
 In their woodland haunt to rest. 
 
 The two classes of Descriptive Poetry of 
 which we have presented illustrations in this and 
 the preceding Chapter, differ in no essential cha- 
 racteristic from each other, except in that which 
 has given rise to the classification we have 
 adopted. The one has reference to minute and 
 single objects; the other embraces varied and 
 complex views of Nature's wide domain. Neces- 
 sarily, therefore, the latter includes the former, 
 as the forest includes its constituent trees ; and 
 the delineation of a tree includes a picture of the 
 leaves which form its chief adornment. To the 
 poet, however, there is a wide difference in the 
 uses to which the two classes of subjects may be 
 applied. The more minute portraiture of single 
 objects is more effective than vague generaliza- 
 tion ; and short, terse descriptions are in continual 
 request for apt comparisons, and other figures of 
 speech. 
 
 Having thus considered the external features 
 of Nature, the heavens above, and the earth 
 beneath ; land and water ; the vegetable and 
 the mineral kingdoms ; the seasons in all their 
 changing aspects, and characteristic phenomena ; 
 
1 74 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 the irrational tribes of the animal creation ; in 
 short the vast universe, Mankind only excepted, 
 we shall now be prepared to receive the poet's 
 inspirations in reference to the human race — the 
 beings for whose occupation and use our globe 
 and its productions have been prepared and set 
 apart. 
 
( i75 
 
 Chapter VII. 
 
 Human Nature ; an independent and important study : 
 illustrative poetical examples, physical, metaphysical, 
 ethical, theological, social, and political ; Fletcher's 
 Purple Island ; general observations. 
 
 What an interminable study is Man ! Singly 
 or socially, physically or metaphysically, sensually 
 or spiritually, the subject enlarges, and expands, 
 and grows before our imaginations as the one 
 proper study in Creation to which all others 
 must acknowledge complete subjection. It has 
 consequently been the poet's particular privilege 
 from time immemorial to sing hymns of praise 
 referring to the abodes of blessed spirits, to excite 
 the passions in war-songs, to commemorate heroic 
 deeds of arms, and in other ways, whether in 
 odes, pastorals, or convivial and bacchanalian 
 ballads to delight their hearers in temples, aca- 
 demies, or at festive boards. No age has been 
 so rude or rustic as to be without its poetic sages, 
 and the sister arts of poetry and music. 
 
 The poetry of Human Nature has the advan- 
 tage over all other poetry of engaging the atten- 
 tion of all classes of society. Hence the drama, 
 which vivifies to the imagination the past, the 
 present, or the remote. Whether the poetry 
 partakes of the social or political ; the influence 
 of the worst or the best passions ; or depicts 
 pleasing or tragical events, so long as the actions 
 
1 76 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 relate to humanity so surely will they live to last 
 and to please. As Akenside declared : — 
 
 all the teeming regions of the south 
 
 Hold not a quarry, to the curious flight 
 Of knowledge, half so tempting or so fair, 
 As man to man. 
 
 The illustrative extracts which ensue will 
 give a pretty clear insight into the poet's 
 usual mode of treating this voluminous subject 
 in certain interesting phases ; and which we 
 have chosen to classify as Physical, Metaphysical, 
 Ethical, Theological, Social, and Political ; not, 
 however, from considering such an arrangement 
 as being absolutely necessary, but simply for 
 convenience. These, like all other extracts, it 
 may be observed, have not been specially sought 
 out, but have occurred along with others in a 
 course of general reading, otherwise the collection 
 might have been made considerably more im- 
 posing, while at the same time no especial 
 advantage would have accrued from such a 
 devious course. 
 
 Physical. 
 
 Man. — 
 
 1. (83.) There be many strange things, but the strangest 
 of them all is Man. Though the sea be white with 
 foam, and wintry winds be blowing, he crosseth over 
 the noisy billows. Earth, Mother Earth, is from ever- 
 lasting to everlasting ; she is the greatest of all god- 
 desses ; but Man fretteth and wearieth her ; for he 
 putteth his horse to harness, and his ploughs go to and 
 fro in the furrow, ever as the seasons come round. He 
 spreadeth his snares for the silly birds ; he gathereth the 
 fishes of the sea in the meshes of his nets ! Man sur- 
 passing in wisdom. By craft he over-reacheth the wild 
 beast upon the mountain, and putteth to his yoke the 
 long-maned steed and the strength of the great bison. 
 
 i. Thompson's Sales Attici. (Sophocles.) Edin. 1867. 
 
MAN, ETC. I77 
 
 He sheltereth himself against the rain and frost ; he 
 maketh laws and ordinances for himself and his brethren ; 
 his thoughts are as swift as the wind ; but he catcheth 
 hold of them a-flying, and mouldeth them into speech. 
 Disease assaileth him in baffling shapes, but he dealeth 
 skilfully with all. Nothing taketh him unawares ; saving 
 Death only; and from Death he cannot escape. O Man, 
 surpassing in wisdom ! 
 
 2. [Hamlet. ,] I have of late, (but wherefore, I know not) 
 lost all my mirth, foregone all custom of exercises : and, 
 indeed, it goes so heavily with my disposition, that this 
 goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory ; 
 this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave 
 o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with 
 golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to me, than 
 foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. What a 
 piece of work is a man ! How noble in reason ! how in- 
 finite in faculties ! in form and moving, how express and 
 admirable ! in action how like an angel ! in apprehension 
 how like a god ! the beauty of the world, the paragon of 
 animals ! And yet to me, what is this quintessence of 
 dust ? man delights not me, — nor woman neither ; though, 
 by your smiling you seem to say so. 
 
 Woman. — 
 
 3. Know you not the season sweet, 
 
 Windless, rainless, calm and still, 
 Which, untouch'd of Summer's heat, 
 
 Hath forgotten Winter's chill ? 
 So sweet the Spring of woman's life, 
 Ere yet the girl puts on the wife ; 
 
 Write the vows, that women swear, 
 On running water, or thin air. 
 
 Baby. — 
 
 4. Fair is the sunlight streaming down ; 
 
 Fair is a sea, clear, blue, serene ; 
 Fair, Autumn, grave in russet gown ; 
 Fair, Spring, bedeckt in mantle green ; 
 
 But neither sound nor sight, I trow, 
 
 In sweetness or in beauty vies 
 With merry noise of baby-crow, 
 
 With starry light of baby-eyes. 
 
 2. Hamlet. Act 2, sc. 2. 3. Thompson's Sales Attici 
 (Sophocles.) 4. Ibid. (Euripides). 
 
 N 
 
1 7 8 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Brows. — 
 
 5. His lowering brows o'erwhelming his fair sight, 
 Like misty vapours when they blot the sky. 
 
 Eyes. — 
 
 6. To see the inclosed lights, now canopy'd 
 Under these windows : White and azure ! lac'd 
 With blue of heaven's own tinct. 
 
 Smiles. — 
 
 7. O, he smiles valiantly, 
 
 * *• H« 
 
 O, yes ; an 'twere a cloud in autumn. 
 
 8. {Ccesar says of Cassius.) 
 
 ; he hears no music : 
 
 Seldom he smiles ; and smiles in such a sort, 
 As if he mock'd himself, and scorn'd his spirij^ 
 That could be mov'd to smile at anything. 
 
 9. Will Ianthe wake again, 
 
 And give that faithful bosom joy 
 Whose sleepless spirit waits to catch 
 Light, life, and rapture from her smiles ? 
 
 Sleep. — 
 
 1. Come, Sleep 
 
 • the balm of woe, 
 
 The poor man's wealth, the prisoner's release, 
 Th' indifferent judge between the high and low! 
 
 2. Enjoy the honey-heavy dew of slumber : 
 Thou hast no figures, nor no fantasies, 
 Which busy care draws in the brains of men ; 
 Therefore thou sleep'st so sound. 
 
 3. the innocent sleep ; 
 
 Sleep that knits up the ravell'd sleave of care, 
 That death of each day's life, sore labour's bath, 
 Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course, 
 Chief nourisher in life's feast; 
 
 4. Harpers must lull him to his rest, 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Till sleep sink down upon his breast, 
 Like the dew on a summer hill. 
 
 5. Shakspeare's Poems [Adonis.) 6. Cymbeline. 7. 
 Troilus and Cressida. 8. Julius Ccesar. 9. Shelley's 
 Queen Mab. 1. Sir P. Sidney, To Sleep. 2. Julius Ccesar. 
 3. Macbeth. 4. Scott's Bridal of Triermain, c. i. 
 
SLEEP, ETC. I79 
 
 5. Tired nature's sweet restorer, balmy sleep ! 
 
 * * * ■ * 
 
 Swift on his downy pinion flies from woe, 
 And lights on lids unsullied with a tear. 
 
 6. A flock of sheep that leisurely pass by, 
 One after one ; the sound of rain, and bees 
 Murmuring; the fall of rivers, winds and seas, 
 Smooth fields, white sheets of water, and pure sky; 
 I've thought of all by turns ; 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Even thus last night, and two nights more, I lay, 
 And could not win thee, Sleep ! by any stealth. 
 
 Our lives. — 
 
 7. All the world 's a stage, 
 
 * * * ■;■ 
 
 At first the infant 
 
 Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms ; 
 And then, the whining school-boy with his satchel, 
 v And shining-morning face, creeping like snail 
 Unwillingly to school : 
 
 And then the lover ; 
 Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad 
 Made to his mistress' eye-brow : 
 
 Then a soldier; 
 Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard, 
 Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel, 
 Seeking the bubble reputation 
 Even in the cannon's mouth : 
 
 And then, the justice : 
 
 Full of wise saws and modern instances, 
 
 The sixth age shifts 
 Into the lean and slipper'd pantaloon ; 
 
 * * * * 
 
 his big manly voice, 
 
 Turning again towards childish treble, pipes 
 And whistles in his sound : 
 
 Last scene of all, 
 That ends this strange eventful history. 
 Is second childishness, and mere oblivion ; 
 Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything. 
 
 5. Young's Night Thoughts. 6. Wordsworth, To. Sleep. 
 7. As yon like it, Act ii. sc. 7. 
 
 N 2 
 
1 8 O NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 8. Four Seasons fill the measure of the year ; 
 There are four seasons in the mind of man : 
 He has his lusty Spring, when fancy clear 
 Takes in all beauty with an easy span : 
 
 He has his Summer, when luxuriously 
 
 Spring's honey'd cud of youthful thought he loves 
 
 To ruminate, and by such dreaming high 
 
 Is nearest unto heaven : quiet coves 
 
 His soul has in its Autumn, when his wings 
 
 He furleth close ; contented so to look 
 
 On mists in idleness — to let fair things 
 
 Pass by unheeded as a threshold brook : — 
 
 He has his Winter too of pale misfeature, 
 
 Or else he would forego his mortal nature. 
 
 9. Time rolls his ceaseless course. The r\ce of yore, 
 
 Who danced our infancy upon their knee, 
 And told our marvelling boyhood legends store, 
 
 Of their strange ventures happ'd by land or sea, 
 How are they blotted from the things that be ! 
 
 How few, all weak and wither'd of their force? 
 Wait on the verge of dark eternity, 
 
 Like stranded wrecks, the tide returning hoarse, 
 To sweep them from our sight ! Time rolls his cease- 
 less course. 
 Old age, &c. — 
 
 10. Though now this grained face of mine be hid 
 In sap-consuming winter's drizzled snow, 
 
 And all the conduits of my blood froze up ; 
 Yet hath my night of life some memory, 
 My wasting lamps some fading glimmer left, 
 My dull deaf ears a little use to hear : 
 All these old witnesses (I cannot err) 
 Tell me thou art my son Antipholis. 
 
 1. But summer months bring wilding shoot 
 From bud to blossom, from bloom to fruit : 
 And years draw on our human span, 
 From child to boy, from boy to man ; 
 And soon in Rokeby's woods is seen 
 
 A gallant boy in hunter's green. * 
 
 Human frame. — 
 
 2. In all her mazes, nature's face they view'd, 
 
 8. Keats' Human Seasons. 9. Scott's Lady of the Lake, 
 c. iii. 10. Comedy of Errors, Act v. sc. 1. 1. Rokeby. 
 2. Garth's Dispensary, c. i. 
 
HUMAN FRAME, ETC. I 8 I 
 
 Now she unfolds the faint and dawning strife 
 Of infant atoms kindling into life ; 
 How ductile matter new meanders takes, 
 And slender trains of twisting fibres makes ; 
 And how the viscous seeks a closer tone, 
 By just degrees to harden into bone ; 
 While the more loose flow from the vital urn, 
 And in full tides of purple streams return ; 
 How lambent flames from life's bright lamps arise, 
 And dart in emanations through the eyes ; 
 How from each sluice a gentle torrent pours, 
 To slake a feverish heat with ambient showers ; 
 Whence their mechanic powers the spirits claim ; 
 How great their force, how delicate their frame ; 
 How the same nerves are fashion'd to sustain 
 The greatest pleasure and the greatest pain. 
 Life. — 
 
 3. The more we live, more brief appear 
 
 Our life's succeeding stages : 
 A day to childhood seems a year, 
 
 And years like passing ages. 
 The gladsome current of our youth 
 
 Ere passion yet disorders, 
 Steals lingering like a river smooth 
 
 Along its grassy borders. 
 But as the careworn cheek grows wan, 
 
 And sorrow's shafts fly thicker, 
 Ye Stars, that measure life to man, 
 
 Why seem your courses quicker ? 
 When joys have lost their bloom and breath 
 
 And life itself is vapid, 
 Why, as we reach the Falls of Death, 
 
 Feel we its tide more rapid ? 
 It may be strange — yet who would change 
 
 Time's course to slower speeding, 
 When one by one our friends have gone 
 
 And left our bosom bleeding ? 
 Heaven gives our years of fading strength 
 
 Indemnifying fleetness ; 
 And those of youth, a seeming length, 
 
 Proportion'd to their sweetness. 
 Death. — 
 
 4. How wonderful is Death, 
 Death, and his brother Sleep ! 
 
 3. Campbell's River of Life. 4. Shelley's Queen Mab. 
 
1 82 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 One, pale as yonder waning moon 
 With lips of lurid blue ; 
 
 The other, rosy as the morn 
 
 When throned on the ocean's wave 
 It blushes o'er the world : 
 
 Yet both so passing wonderful ! 
 
 those azure veins 
 
 Which steal like streams along a field of snow, 
 
 That lovely outline, which is fair 
 As breathing marble, 
 
 We are such stuff 
 
 As dreams are made on, and our little life 
 Is rounded with a sleep. 
 
 Metaphysical. 
 Mind, &c. — 
 
 1. 'Twas given to man to view the heavens on high, 
 But not in them the mysteries of the sky ; 
 
 Yet boldly dares his reason penetrate 
 
 The darksome chaos, o'er it to dilate. 
 
 With staggering step, thus scorning heavenly light, 
 
 In error's paths he wanders, lost in night. 
 
 Confused, but not made wise, he pores about, 
 
 Betwixt opinion wavering and doubt. 
 
 Seeking for light, and shadows doom'd to feel, 
 
 He ponders, studies, labours to unseal 
 
 The secret, and at length finds his advance ; 
 
 The more he learns, how great his ignorance. 
 
 Of matter, form, or motion, or the soul, 
 
 Or moments that away incessant roll, 
 
 Or the unfathomable sea of space, 
 
 Without a sky, without a shore to trace, 
 
 Nothing he reaches, nothing comprehends, 
 
 Nor finds its origin, nor where it tends ; 
 
 But only sinking, all absorb'd may see 
 
 In the abysses of eternity. 
 
 2. How poor, how rich, how abject, how august, 
 How complete, how wonderful, is man ! 
 
 O what a miracle to man is man. 
 
 5. The Tempest, Act iv. sc. 1. 1. Kennedy's Poets of 
 Spain (Gaspar Melchor de Jovellanos). i860. 2. Young's 
 
 Night Thoughts. 
 
MIND, ETC. 183 
 
 3. Mysterious Thought, swift angel of the mind ! 
 By space unbounded, tho' to space confin'd, 
 
 How dost thou glow with just disdain ? how scorn ? 
 That Thought cou'd ever think thee earthly born, 
 Thou who canst distance motion in thy flight, 
 Wing with aspiring plume the wond'rous height, 
 Swifter than light, outspeed the flame of day, 
 Pierce through the dark profound, and shame the 
 
 darting ray, 
 Throughout the universal system range, 
 New form old systems, and new systems change, 
 Thro' Nature trafnck on, from pole to pole, 
 And stamp new worlds on thy dilated soul ; 
 (By Time unlimited, unbounded by Space) 
 Sure demonstration of thy heav'nly race, 
 Deriv'd from that, which is deriv'd from none, 
 Which ever Is, but of Himself alone 
 
 Genius. — 
 
 4. Nature's kindling breath 
 
 Must fire the chosen genius ; nature's hand 
 Must string his nerves, and imp his eagle-wings 
 Impatient of the painful sleep, to soar 
 High as the summit : there to breathe at large 
 Ethereal air, with bards and sages old, 
 Immortal sons of praise. 
 
 Man and Nature. — 
 
 5. I live not in myself, but I become 
 Portion of that around me ; and to me 
 High mountains are a feeling, but the hum 
 Of human cities tortures : I can see 
 Nothing to loathe in nature, save to be 
 
 A link reluctant in a fleshly chain, 
 Class'd among creatures, when the soul can flee, 
 And with the sky, the peak, and heaving plain 
 Of ocean, or the stars, mingle, and not in vain. 
 
 Are not the mountains, waves, and skies, a part 
 Of me and of my soul, as I of them ? 
 Is not the love of these deep in my heart 
 With a pure passion ? should I not contemn 
 All objects, if compared with these ? and stem 
 A tide of suffering, rather than forego 
 
 3. H. Brooks's Universal Beauty, 1735. 4. Akenside's 
 Pleasures of Imagination. 5. Byron's Childe Harold, c. iii. 
 
1 84 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Such feelings for the hard and worldly phlegm 
 Of those whose eyes are only turn'd below, 
 Gazing upon the ground, with thoughts which dare 
 not glow ? 
 Passions. — 
 
 6. Many terrible things doth Earth nurture in her bosom ; 
 many creatures terrible to man doth Ampfritrite hold 
 within her arms ; consider also the lightning that 
 gleameth between heaven and earth, the flying birds, 
 and the beasts of the field, and the anger of tempestuous 
 winds. But who shall fully tell the daring spirit of man, 
 or of woman ? or the passion of desire that dareth all, 
 and is linked with sorrow ? 
 
 7. Like the cluster'd stars that roll 
 In a circle round the pole, 
 
 Come, and go, and come again : 
 Nought within wide Nature's range 
 But must ever change and change ; 
 Spangled Night must pale away 
 Before the glory of the Day , 
 Death broods here, and there the while 
 Baby-lips begin to smile ; 
 If we joy o'er riches won, 
 Ere the words of joy be done, 
 The substance of our joy is gone. 
 Love. — 
 
 8. Standest thou, Love, a power alone ? 
 Or art thou twenty powers in one ? 
 
 O thou art Agony, and Delight, 
 Sweet Weakness, and resistless Might ; 
 Without appeal, thy slightest breath 
 Passeth award of life and death ; 
 Thou can'st with Frenzy fire the brain, 
 And Fever pour thro' every vein ; 
 And, even when the passion tide 
 
 Thro' throbbing pulse and vein is sent, 
 Can'st calm the troubled soul, and guide 
 
 To tranquil efforts and still content : 
 The fish that in the waters glide, 
 
 The birds thro' air that wing their way, 
 The beast that roams the mountain side 
 
 Thy penetrant influence must obey ; 
 
 O Love, to thee all things must yield, 
 
 6. Thompson's Sales Attici (j<Eschylus). 7. 8. Ibid. 
 (Sophocles.) 
 
LOVE. 185 
 
 Bird of the air and beast of the field ; 
 Cold-blooded fish that swim the sea, 
 Brutes of the forest, none are free 
 When in the cheek of sweet maiden sixteen 
 Bird-like thou buildest a cozy warm nest, 
 Then canst thou make, as may daily be seen, 
 Fools of our wisest, and knaves of our best. 
 9. Whence comes my love ? O heart disclose ; 
 It was from cheeks that shamed the rose, 
 From lips that spoil the ruby's praise, 
 From eyes that mock the diamond's blaze : 
 
 1. I tell thee love is nature's second sun, 
 Causing a spring of virtues where he shines. 
 And as without the sun, the world's great eye, 
 All colours, beauties, both of art and nature, 
 Are given in vain to men ; so without love 
 All beauties bred in woman are in vain, 
 
 All virtues born in men lie buried, 
 
 For love informs them as the sun doth colours. 
 
 2. Love is a smoke rais'd with the fume of sighs ; 
 Being purg'd, a fire sparkling in lovers' eyes ; 
 Being vex'd, a sea nourish'd with lovers' tears : 
 What is it else ? a madness most discreet, 
 
 A choking gall, and a preserving sweet. 
 
 3. Pro. , As in the sweetest bud 
 
 The eating canker dwells, so eating love 
 
 Inhabits in the finest wits of all. 
 
 Vol. And writers say, As the most forward bud 
 
 Is eaten by the canker ere it blow, 
 
 Even so by love the young and tender wit 
 
 Is turn'd to folly ; blasting in the bud, 
 
 Losing his verdure even in the prime, 
 
 And all the fair effects of future hopes. 
 
 4. Oh, how this spring of love resembleth 
 
 The uncertain glory of an April day ; 
 Which now shows all the beauty of the sun, 
 And by and by a cloud takes all away ! 
 
 Frail Beauty. — 
 
 5. Brittle beautie, that Nature made so fraile, 
 Whereof the gifte is smalle, and shorte is the season ; 
 
 9. J. Harrington's Sonnet. 1. G. Chapman's Comedy 
 of All Fools. 2. Romeo and Juliet. 3, 4. Two Gentlemen 
 of Verona. 5. H. Howard, Earl of Surrey, Frailtie of 
 Beautie. 
 
1 8 6 NATU RE-STUDY. 
 
 Flouring to-day, to-morrow apt to faile ; 
 
 Fickle treasure, abhorred of reason : 
 
 Dangerous to deal with, — vain, — of none avail ; 
 
 Costlie in keeping, past — not worth two peason ; 
 
 Slipper and sliding, as is an eel's tail ; 
 
 Hard to obtain, once gotten, not geason : 
 
 Jewell of jeopardy, that peril dothe assail ; 
 
 False and untrue, enticeth oft to treason ; 
 
 Enemie to youth, that most may I bewaile ; 
 
 Ah ! bitter sweet, infecting as the poison, 
 
 Thou farest as fruit that with the frost is taken : 
 To-day ready ripe, to-morrow all too shaken. 
 
 Matchless Beauty. — 
 
 6. Where is the maiden of mortal strain, 
 
 That may match with the Baron of Triermain ? 
 She must be lovely, and constant, and kind, 
 Holy and pure, and humble of mind, 
 Blithe of cheer, and gentle of mood, 
 Courteous, and generous, and noble of blood — 
 Lovely as the sun's first ray, 
 When it breaks the clouds of an April day ; 
 Constant and true as the widow'd dove, 
 Kind as a minstrel that sings of love ; 
 Pure as the fountain in rocky cave, 
 Where never sunbeam kiss'd the wave ; 
 Humble as maiden that loves in vain, 
 
 Gentle as breeze that but whispers and dies, 
 
 Yet blithe as the light leaves that dance in its sighs ; 
 
 Generous as spring-dews that bless the glad ground ; 
 
 Melancholy. — 
 
 7. Welcome, folded arms, and fixed eyes, 
 A sigh that piercing mortifies, 
 
 A look that's fastened on the ground, 
 A tongue chained up without a sound ! 
 Fountain-heads, and pathless groves, 
 Places which pale passion loves ! 
 Moonlight walks, when all the fowls 
 Are warmly housed, save bats and owls ! 
 
 # * — a parting groan ! 
 
 These are the sounds we feed upon ; 
 
 6. Scott's Bridal of Triermain, c. i. 7. Beaumont 
 and Fletcher. 
 
LIBERTY, ETC. I 87 
 
 Liberty. — 
 
 8. I must have liberty 
 Withal, as large a charter as the wind, 
 
 To blow on whom I please : for so fools have : 
 And they that are most galled with my folly, 
 They most must laugh : 
 
 Time. — 
 
 9. The Gods alone know neither age nor death ; 
 
 On all things else Time breathes a withering breath ; 
 The fruits of earth grow, ripen, and decay ; 
 Man's strength and beauty dwindle, day by day ; 
 Faith, dying out, commingles with the dust, 
 From whence upsprings a harvest of distrust : 
 Ever 'twixt man and man, 'twixt state and state, 
 The breeze of Love veers round to gale of Hate ; 
 What's sweet to-day is by to-morrow sour : — 
 Thus change we all beneath Time's magic power. 
 Some once a season, others twice an hour. 
 
 Ethical. 
 Generous Nature. — 
 
 1. Behold, O man ! that toilsome pains dost take 
 The flowers, the fields, and all that pleasant grows, 
 How they themselves do thine ensample make, 
 Whiles nothing envious Nature them forth throws 
 Out of her fruitful lap : how no man knows 
 
 They spring, they bud, they blossom fresh and fair, 
 And deck the world with their rich pompous shows ; 
 Yet no man for them taketh pains or care, 
 Yet no man to them can his careful pains compare. 
 
 The lily, lady of the flow'ring field, 
 The flower-de-luce, her lovely paramour, 
 Bid thee to them thy fruitless labours yield, 
 And soon leave off the toilsome weary stour ; 
 Lo, lo ! how brave she decks her bounteous bower, 
 With silken curtains and gold coverlets, 
 Therein to shroud her sumptuous belamoure ; 
 Yet neither spins nor cards, ne cares nor frets, 
 But to her mother Nature all her care she lets. 
 
 Life. — 
 
 2. The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill 
 together: our virtues would be proud, if our faults 
 whipp'd them not ; and our crimes would despair, if 
 they were not cherished by our virtues. 
 
 8. Asyoulikeit. 9. Thompson's Sales Attici, (Sophocles.) 
 1. Fairy Queen, b. ii. c. 6. 2. All's well that ends well. 
 
1 8 8 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Pride. — 
 
 3. O, the good gods, 
 
 How blind is pride ! What eagles are we still 
 In matters that belong to other men ! 
 What beetles in our own ! 
 
 Virtues. — 
 
 4. his virtues 
 
 Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongu'd, against 
 The deep damnation of his taking off; 
 And pity, like a naked new-born babe, 
 Striding the blast, or heaven's cherubin, hors'd 
 Upon the sightless couriers of the air, 
 Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye, 
 That tears shall drown the wind. 
 
 5. The chariest maid is prodigal enough, 
 If she unmask her beauty to the moon : 
 Virtue itself 'scapes not calumnious strokes : 
 The canker galls the infants of the spring, 
 Too oft before their buttons be disclos'd ; 
 And in the morn and liquid dew of youth 
 Contagious blastments are most imminent. 
 
 6. Be thou as chaste as ice, as pure as snow, thou 
 
 shalt not escape calumny. 
 
 Ingratitude. — 
 
 7. Blow, blow, thou wintry wind, 
 Thou art not so unkind 
 
 As man's ingratitude ; 
 
 Thy tooth is not so keen, 
 
 Because thou art not seen, 
 
 Although thy breath be rude. 
 * * * 
 
 Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky, 
 That dost not bite so nigh 
 
 As benefits forgot : 
 Though thou the waters warp, 
 Thy sting is not so sharp 
 
 As friend remember'd not. 
 
 Nature's Lessons. — 
 
 8. Here feel we but the penalty of Adam, 
 The season's difference ; as the icy fang, 
 And churlish chiding of the winter's wind ; 
 Which when it bites and blows upon my body, 
 Even till I shrink with cold, I smile and say, — 
 
 3. G. Chapman, Pride. 4. Macbeth, Act i. sc. 7. 
 
 5, 6. Hamlet. 7, 8. As you like it. 
 
FLATTERY, ETC. I 89 
 
 This is no flattery : these are counsellors 
 
 That feelingly persuade me what I am. 
 
 * * * # 
 
 And this our life, exempt from public haunt, 
 
 Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, 
 
 Sermons in stones, and good in everything. 
 
 Flattery. — 
 
 9. Every one that flatters thee 
 
 Is no friend in misery, 
 Words are easy like the wind : 
 Faithful friends are hard to find. 
 
 Slander. — 
 
 1. No, 'tis slander ; 
 
 whose tongue 
 
 Out-venoms all the worms of Nile ; whose breath 
 Rides on the posting winds, and doth belie 
 
 All corners of the world ; 
 
 * the secrets of the grave 
 
 This vip'rous slander enters. 
 
 2. The evil, that men do, lives after them ; 
 The good is oft interred with their bones ; 
 So let it be with Caesar ! 
 
 Idleness. — 
 
 3. A soul immortal, spending all her fires, 
 Wasting her strength in strenuous idleness, 
 Thrown into tumults, raptured or alarm'd, 
 At ought this scene can threaten or indulge, 
 Resembles ocean into tempest wrought, 
 
 To waft a feather, or to drown a fly. 
 
 4. Thick in yon stream of light, a thousand ways, 
 Upward, and downward, thwarting and convoled, 
 The quivering nations sport ; till tempest-winged, 
 Fierce Winter sweeps them from the face of day. 
 Even so luxurious men, unheeding, pass 
 
 An idle summer-life in fortune's shine, 
 A season's glitter ! thus they flutter on 
 From toy to toy, from vanity to vice ; 
 Till, blown away by death, oblivion comes 
 Behind, and strikes them from the book of life. 
 
 9. Shakspeare's Poems. 1. Cymbeline. 2. Julius 
 Ccesar. 3. Young's Night Thoughts. 4. Thomson's 
 Seasons. {Summer). 
 
1 90 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Coward. — 
 
 5. I know him a notorious liar, 
 
 Think him a great way fool, solely a coward ; 
 Yet these fix'd evils sit so fit in him, 
 That they take place, when virtue's steely bones 
 Look bleak in the cold wind : 
 
 6. And love and friendship on his coward heart 
 Shine like the powerless sun on polar ice. 
 
 Bounty. — 
 
 7. For his bounty, 
 
 There was no winter in't ; an autumn 'twas, 
 That grew the more by reaping : 
 
 Ruin. — 
 
 8. Ale. How came the noble Timon to this change ? 
 Tim. As the moon does, but wanting light to give ; 
 
 But then renew I could not, like the moon ; 
 There were no suns to borrow of. 
 
 1. What numbers, once in fortune's lap high-fed, 
 Solicit the cold hand of charity ! 
 
 To shock us more, solicit it in vain ! 
 Good or Evil Fortune. — 
 
 2. Our remedies oft in ourselves do He, 
 Which we ascribe to heaven : the fated sky 
 Gives us free scope ; only, doth backward pull 
 Our slow designs, when we ourselves are dull. 
 
 Ambition, &c. — 
 
 3. ('a fire and motion of the soul ') 
 
 — but once kindled, quenchless evermore 
 Preys upon high adventure, nor can tire 
 Of aught but rest, 
 
 4. The high, the mountain majesty of worth 
 Should be, and shall, survivor of its woe, 
 And from its immortality look forth 
 
 In the sun's face, like yonder Alpine snow, 
 Imperishably pure beyond all things below. 
 
 5. Tell me not, in mournful numbers, 
 
 Life is but a empty dream ! 
 For the soul is dead that slumbers, 
 And things are not what they seem. 
 
 5. AIVs well that en'ds well. 6. S. T. Coleridge's Lit. Re- 
 mains. 7. Antony and Cleopatra. 8. Timon of Athens. 
 1. Night Thoughts. 2. Alls well that ends well. 3, 4. Byron's 
 Childe Harold, c. iii. 5. H, W. Longfellow's Psalm of 
 Life. 
 
AMBITION, ETC. 191 
 
 Life is real ! Life is earnest ! 
 
 And the grave is not its goal ; 
 Dust thou art, to dust returnest, 
 
 Was not spoken of the soul. 
 * * * 
 
 Lives of great men all remind us 
 
 We can make our lives sublime, 
 And, departing, leave behind us 
 
 Footprints on the sands of time ; 
 
 * * * 
 
 Let us, then, be up and doing, 
 
 With a heart for any fate ; 
 Still achieving, still pursuing, 
 
 Learn to labour and to wait. 
 
 6. It is not growing like a tree 
 
 In bulk, doth make Man better be ; 
 Or standing long an oak, three hundred year, 
 To fall a log at last, dry, bald, and sere : 
 A lily of a day, 
 Is fairer far in May, 
 Although it fall and die that night — 
 It was the plant and flower of Light. 
 In small proportions we just beauties see ; 
 And in short measures life may perfect be. 
 Life. — 
 
 7. Life is like the stormy breezes 
 
 Raging with a restless sway ; 
 Like the wintry wind that freezes 
 
 Snow-heaps which soon melt away. 
 Age, age — year, year overpowers ; 
 
 Still they flow, and still they must ; 
 And while children gather flowers, 
 
 Aged fathers sleep in dust. 
 Rouse thee, up to noble doing, 
 
 Noble cares and thoughts pursue ; 
 Even the boisterous wind, pursuing 
 
 Its fierce course, wafts drops of dew. 
 Age. — 
 
 8. The spring, proudly smiling, 
 Shall all things revive ; 
 And gay bridal-garments 
 
 Of splendour shall give. 
 
 6. Ben Jonson, The Noble Nature. 7. Bowring's Magyar 
 Poems ; Hungarian Song. 8. Bowring's Russian Poets, 
 (Karamsin.) 
 
192 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 But man's chilling .winter 
 Is darksome and dim ; 
 For no second spring-tide 
 E'er dawns upon him. 
 
 Death. — 
 9. The very moment that man biddeth adieu unto the 
 world, 
 Dust, and silver, and gold, unto him, are all three 
 one. 
 
 i. Death is here and death is there, 
 
 Death is busy everywhere, 
 All around, within, beneath, 
 Above, is death — and we are death. 
 
 Death has set his mark and seal 
 On all we are and all we feel, 
 On all we know and all we fear. 
 
 Theological. 
 
 Divine Love. — 
 
 2. Behold, thou art fair, my love ; behold, thou art fair : 
 
 thou hast doves' eyes within thy locks : thy hair 
 is as a flock of goats, that appear from mount 
 Gilead. (1.) 
 Thy lips, O my spouse, drop as the honey-comb : 
 honey and milk are under thy tongue ; and the 
 smell of thy garments is like the smell of Lebanon. 
 
 (no 
 
 3. My beloved is white and ruddy, the chiefest among 
 
 ten thousand. (10.) 
 His head is as the most fine gold, his locks are bushy, 
 
 and black as a raven, (n.) 
 His eyes are the eyes of doves by the rivers of waters, 
 
 washed with milk, and fitly set. (12.) 
 His cheeks are as a bed of spices, as sweet flowers : 
 
 his lips are like lilies, dropping sweet-smelling 
 
 myrrh. (13.) 
 
 4. Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, fair as 
 
 the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army 
 with banners ? (10.) 
 
 5. Set me as a seal upon thine heart, as a seal upon 
 
 thine arm : for love is strong as death ; jealousy is 
 
 9. Raverty's Afghan Poetry, 1862. 1. Shelley, Death. 
 2. Solomon s Song, c. iv. 3. Ibid., c. v. 4. Ibid., c. vi. 
 S. Ibid., c. viii. 
 
DEVOTION, ETC. I 93 
 
 cruel as the grave ; the coals thereof are coals of 
 fire, which hath a most vehement flame. (6.) 
 Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the 
 floods drown it : if a man would give all the sub- 
 stance of his house for love, it would utterly be 
 contemned. (7.) 
 
 Devotion. — 
 
 6. A man on earth devoted to the skies ; 
 
 Like ships in seas, while in, above the world. 
 
 He sees with other eyes than theirs ; where they 
 Behold a sun, he spies a Deity ; 
 What makes them only smile, makes him adore. 
 Where they see mountains, he but atoms sees ; 
 An empire in his balance weighs a grain. 
 Soul.— 
 
 7. What though my strains and sorrows flow combin'd? 
 Yet ears are slow, and carnal eyes are blind. 
 
 Free through each mortal form the spirits roll, 
 But sight avails not. — Can we see the soul ? 
 
 Futurity. — 
 
 8. All, all on earth is shadow ; all beyond 
 
 Is substance ; the reverse is Folly's creed : 
 How solid all, where change shall be no more ! 
 
 Sun.— 
 
 9. Hangs out the sun his lustre but for me, 
 
 The single man ? 
 
 Blood. — 
 
 1. Which blood cries, 
 
 Even from the tongueless caverns of the earth. 
 
 Vengeance. — 
 
 2. the will of heaven ; 
 
 Who, when they see the hours ripe on earth, 
 Will rain hot vengeance on offenders' heads. 
 
 Social. 
 
 Rich Parents. — 
 
 3. How quickly nature falls into revolt, 
 When gold becomes her object ! 
 
 over-careful fathers 
 
 6, 8, 9. Young's Night Thoughts. 7. S. Rousseau's 
 Flowers of Persian Literature. 1,2. Richard II. 3. King 
 Henry IV., 2nd Part, Act iv. sc. 4. 
 
 O 
 
194 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 For this they have been thoughtful to invest 
 
 Their sons with arts and martial exercises : 
 
 When, like the bee, tolling [taking toll] from every 
 
 flower 
 The virtuous sweets ; 
 
 Our thighs pack'd with wax, our mouths with honey, 
 We bring it to the hive ; and like the bees, 
 Are murder'd for our pains. 
 
 Character. — 
 
 4. he (Ajax) is as valiant as the lion, churlish as 
 
 the bear, slow as the elephant. 
 
 5. With a half-glance upon the sky 
 At night he said, ' The wanderings 
 Of this most intricate Universe 
 Teach me' the nothingness of things.' 
 Yet could not all creation pierce 
 Beyond the bottom of his eye. 
 
 Youth. — 
 
 6. But thou art fair ; and at thy birth, dear boy ! 
 Nature and fortune join'd to make thee great : 
 Of nature's gifts, thou may'st with lilies boast, 
 And with the half-blown rose : — 
 
 7. Thou divine Nature, how thyself thou blazon'st. 
 In these two princely boys ! They are as gentle 
 As zephyrs, blowing below the violet, 
 
 and yet as rough, 
 
 Their royal blood enchaf 'd, as the rudest wind, 
 That by the top doth take the mountain pine, 
 And make him stoop to the vale. 
 
 8. Like a clear little stream, 
 
 That with scarcely a sound, 
 Through the plain among flowers, 
 
 Glides whirling around, 
 So the fugitive years 
 
 Of my easy life sped, 
 Amidst laughter and play, 
 
 Like a dream have fled. 
 On that dream to look back, 
 
 Oft in wonder I dwell ; 
 Nor to tear me have power 
 
 From its pleasing spell. 
 
 4. Troilus and Cressida. 5. Tennyson's Poems, 1857. 
 6. King John. 7. Cymbeline. 8. Kennedy's Poets of 
 Spain, (Melendez.) 
 
YOUTH. I95 
 
 9. Little charm of placid mien, 
 
 Miniature of Beauty's Queen, 
 Numbering years, a scanty nine, 
 Stealing hearts without design, 
 Young inveigler, fond in wiles, 
 Prone to mirth, profuse in smiles, 
 Yet a novice in disdain, 
 Pleasure giving without pain, 
 Still caressing, still caressed, 
 Thou and all thy lovers blessed, 
 Never teased, and never teasing, 
 Oh for ever pleased and pleasing ! 
 
 Is the silken web so thin 
 As the texture of her skin ? 
 Can the lily and the rose 
 Such unsullied hue disclose ? 
 Are the violets so blue 
 As her veins exposed to view ? 
 Do the stars in wintry sky 
 Twinkle brighter than her eye ? 
 Has the morning lark a throat 
 Sounding sweeter than her note ? 
 
 1. Little gossip, blithe and hale, 
 Tattling many a broken tale, 
 Singing many a tuneless song, 
 Lavish of a heedless tongue ; 
 Simple maiden, void of art, 
 Babbling out the very heart, 
 Yet abandon'd to thy will, 
 Yet imagining no ill, 
 
 Yet too innocent to blush ; 
 Like the linnet in the bush 
 To the mother-linnet's note 
 Moduling her slender throat; 
 Chirping forth thy petty joys, 
 Wanton in the change of toys. 
 
 2. Swift the golden moments flitted 
 
 Of my childhood's blissful days- 
 Soon the smiling joys retreated, 
 
 Which o'er boyhood flung their rays. 
 
 9. A. Philips, To Miss Carteret. 1. Ibid, To Miss 
 Pulteney. 2. Bowring's Magyar Poetry, (Kisfaludy.) 
 
 O 2 
 
I96 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Spring, whose footstep never lingers, 
 
 Flowers upon the vernal field, 
 All the forest's plumy singers, 
 
 All the lights that nature gild — 
 Will not winter's breath destroy them ? 
 Other springs shall re-enjoy them ; 
 
 Youth re-kindles not its beam — 
 
 Why do I so idly dream ? 
 
 Friendship. — 
 
 3. . So we grew together, 
 
 Like to a double cherry, seeming parted ; 
 But yet a union in partition, 
 
 Two lovely berries moulded on one stem : 
 So, with two seeming bodies, but one heart. 
 
 4. we still have slept together, 
 
 Rose at an instant, learn'd, play'd, eat together; 
 And whereso'er we went, like Juno's swans, 
 Still we went coupled and inseparable. 
 
 Hand. — 
 
 5. O that her hand ! 
 
 In whose comparison all whites are ink, 
 Writing their own reproach ; 
 
 Indecision. — 
 
 6. Her tongue will not obey her heart, nor can 
 
 Her heart inform her tongue: the swan's down feather, 
 That stands upon the swell at full of tide, 
 And neither way inclines. 
 
 Loveliness. — 
 
 7. O thou, whose wanton footsteps tread 
 The garden's flower-enamell'd glade, 
 Whose pouting rose-bud lips contain 
 More luscious honey than the cane, 
 Whose eyes in liquid lustre shine 
 Bright as the hue of sparkling wine, 
 Whose bending eyebrows shafts of woe 
 Dart like arrows from the bow, 
 
 Brows that stole their pearly light 
 
 From the silver queen of night, 
 
 Whose charms have stol'n my soul away, — 
 
 Thy name, thou beauteous tyrant, say ! 
 
 3. Midsummer Night's Dream. 4. As you like it. 5. 
 Troilus and Cressida. 6. Antony and Cleopatra. 7. Dr. J. 
 Leyden's Poetical Remains; Ode from the Persic of Khakani. 
 
LOVELINESS. 
 
 The wine of love, that thrills the soul, 
 Thy bard has drunk beyond control ; 
 To learn thy name would gladly drain 
 His life from each enamour'd vein : 
 Thou charmer of Khakani, say, 
 What beauty steals his soul away ? — 
 
 8. Sweet, be not proud of those two eyes 
 Which starlike sparkle in their skies ; 
 Nor be you proud, that you can see 
 All hearts your captives ; yours yet free 
 Be you not proud of that rich hair 
 Which wantons with the love-sick air; 
 Whenas that ruby which you wear, 
 Sunk from the tip of your soft ear, 
 Will last to be a precious stone 
 When all your world of beauty's gone. 
 
 9. beauty 
 
 A crystal brow, a moon's despair, 
 
 the snow's daughter, a white hand, 
 
 mermaid's "yellow pride of hair. 
 
 97 
 
 your starry eyes, 
 
 Your lips that seem on roses fed, 
 
 Your breasts, where Cupid trembling lies, 
 
 Nor sleeps for kissing of his bed : — 
 
 A bloomy pair of vermeil cheeks, 
 Like Hebe's in her ruddiest hours, 
 A breath that softer music speaks 
 Than summer winds a-wooing flowers. * 
 
 1. Thou seem'st a rosebud born in snow; 
 A flower of purpose sprung to bow 
 To heedless tempests and the rage 
 
 Of an incensed stormy age : 
 
 And yet as balm-trees gently spend 
 
 Their tears for those that do them rend, 
 
 Thou didst nor murmur nor revile, 
 
 But drank'st thy wormwood with a smile. 
 
 2. She walks in beauty, like the night 
 
 Of cloudless climes and starry skies ; 
 And all that's best of dark and bright 
 Meet in her aspect and her eyes : 
 
 8. He.rrick, To Dianeme. 9. Dr. Trench's Household Book 
 
 of Poetry ; Anon, True Loveliness. 1. Ibid., H .Vaughan, 
 To Elizabeth of Bohemia. 2. Byron, She walks in Beauty. 
 
 * These lines are given in contrast to True Loveliness. 
 
I 9 8 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Thus mellowed to that tender light 
 
 Which heaven to gaudy day denies. 
 One shade the more, one ray the less, 
 
 Had half impaired the nameless grace, 
 Which waves in every raven tress, 
 
 Or softly lightens o'er her face ; 
 Where thoughts serenely sweet express, 
 
 How pure, how dear their dwelling-place. 
 And on that cheek, and o'er that brow, 
 
 So soft, so calm, yet eloquent, 
 The smiles that win, the tints that glow, 
 
 But tell of days in goodness spent, 
 A mind at peace with all below, 
 
 A heart whose love is innocent! 
 Love. — 
 
 3. Come live with me and be my love, 
 And we will all the pleasures prove, 
 That valleys, groves, [or] hills, and fields, 
 Woods or steepy mountain yields. 
 
 And we will sit upon the rocks, 
 Seeing the shepherds feed their flocks, 
 By shallow rivers, to whose falls 
 Melodious birds sing madrigals. 
 
 4. — At first 
 I stuck my choice upon her, ere my heart 
 Durst make too bold a herald of my tongue : 
 Where the impression of mine eye infixing, 
 Contempt his scornful perspective did lend me, 
 Which warp'd the line of every other favour ; 
 Scorn'd a fair colour, or express'd it stol'n ; 
 Extended or contracted all proportions, 
 
 To a most hideous object : Thence it came, 
 That she, whom all men prais'd, and whom myself, 
 Since I have lost, have lov'd, was in mine eye 
 The dust that did offend it. 
 
 5. O, thou didst then ne'er love so heartily : 
 If thou remember'st not the slightest folly 
 That ever love did make thee run into, 
 Thou hast not lov'd : 
 
 Or if thou hast not sat as I do now, 
 Wearying thy hearer in thy mistress' praise, 
 Thou hast not lov'd : 
 Or if thou hast not broke from company, 
 
 3. Marlow, The Passionate Shepherd to his Love. 4. 
 AIVs well that ends well. 5. As you like it. 
 
LOVE. I99 
 
 Abruptly, as my passion now makes me, 
 Thou hast not lov'd: 
 
 6. My lovely Aaron, wherefore look'st thou sad, 
 When everything doth make a gleeful boast ? 
 The birds chant melody on every bush ; 
 The snake lies rolled in the cheerful sun ; 
 The green leaves quiver with the cooling wind, 
 And make a chequer'd shadow on the ground : 
 Under their sweet shade, Aaron, let us sit. 
 
 7. Luc. I do not seek to quench you love's hot fire ; 
 But qualify the fire's extreme rage, 
 
 Lest it should burn above the bounds of reason. 
 Jul. The more thou damm'st it up, the more it 
 burns : 
 The current that with gentle murmur glides, 
 Thou know'st being stopp'd, impatiently doth rage : 
 But, when his fair course is not hindered, 
 He makes sweet music with the enamel'd stones, 
 Giving a gentle kiss to every sedge 
 He overtaketh in his pilgrimage; 
 And so by many winding nooks he strays, 
 With willing sport to the wild ocean. 
 Then let me go, and hinder not my course : 
 I'll be as patient as a gentle stream, 
 And make a pastime of each weary step, 
 Till the last step have brought me to my love ; 
 
 8. What light is light, if Silvia be not seen ? 
 What joy is joy, if Silvia be not by ? 
 Unless it be, to think that she is by, 
 And feed upon the shadow of perfection. 
 Except I be by Silvia in the night, 
 There is no music in the nightingale ; 
 Unless I look on Silvia in the day, 
 There is no day for me to look upon ; 
 
 He says, he loves my daughter, 
 I think so too ; for never gazed the moon 
 Upon the water, as he'll stand, and read, 
 As 'twere, my daughter's eyes : and, to be plain. 
 I think, there is not half a kiss to choose, 
 Which loves another best. 
 
 6. Titus Andvonicus. 7. Two Gentlemen of Verona, 
 Act ii. sc. 7. 8. Ibid., Act iii. sc. 1. 9. Winter s Tale. 
 
200 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Love.- 
 
 i. Imogen. I would have broke mine eye-strings ; crack'd 
 them, but 
 To look upon him ; till the diminution 
 Of space had pointed him sharp as my needle : 
 Nay, follow'd him 'till he had melted from 
 The smallness of a gnat to air ; and then 
 Have turn'd mine eye, and wept. 
 
 2. She never told her love, 
 
 But let concealment, like a worm i' the bud, 
 Feed on her damask cheek : she pin'd in thought; 
 And, with a green and yellow melancholy, 
 She sat like Patience on a monument, 
 Smiling at Grief. 
 
 3. Juliet. Wilt thou begone ? it is not yet near day : 
 
 It was the nightingale, and not the lark, 
 That pierc'd the fearful hollow of thine ear ; 
 Nightly she sings on yon pomegranate tree : 
 Believe me, love, it was the nightingale. 
 
 Romeo. It was the lark, the herald of the morn, 
 No nightingale : look, love, what envious streaks 
 Do lace the severing clouds in yonder east : 
 Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund day 
 Stands tiptoe on the misty mountains' tops ; 
 I must be gone and live, or stay and die, [being 
 banished.] 
 
 Juliet. Yon light is not day-light, I know it, I ; 
 It is some meteor that the sun exhales, 
 To be to thee this night a torch-bearer, 
 And light thee on thy way to Mantua : 
 Therefore stay yet, thou need'st not to be gone. 
 
 Romeo. Let me be ta'en, let me be put to death ; 
 I am content, if thou wilt have it so. 
 I'll say yon grey is not the morning's eye, 
 'Tis but the pale reflex of Cynthia's brow ; 
 Nor that is not the lark, whose notes do beat 
 The vaulty heaven so high above our heads : 
 I have more care to stay, than will to go ; — 
 Come, death, and welcome ! Juliet wills it so. — 
 How is't, my soul ? let's talk, it is not day. 
 
 1. Cymbeline, Act i. sc. 4. 2. Twelfth Night, Act ii. s. 4. 
 3. Romeo and Juliet, Act iii. sc. 5. 
 
LOVE, ETC. 20 1 
 
 4. The lowest trees have tops ; the ant her gall ; 
 
 The fly her spleen ; the little sparks their heat ; 
 The slender hairs cast shadows, though but small ; 
 
 And bees have stings, although they be not great. 
 Seas have their surges, so have shallow springs ; 
 And love is love, in beggars as in kings. 
 Where rivers smoothest run, deep are the fords ; 
 
 The dial stirs, yet none perceives it move ; 
 The firmest faith is in the fewest words ; 
 
 The turtles cannot sing, and yet they love. 
 True hearts have eyes, and ears, no tongues to speak ; 
 They hear and see, and sigh ; and then they break. 
 
 Woman. — 
 
 5. O, woman ! in our hours of ease, 
 Uncertain, coy, and hard to please, 
 And variable as the shade 
 
 By the light quivering aspen made ; 
 When pain and anguish wring the brow, 
 A ministering angel thou ! 
 
 6. the sigh 
 
 And virgin-glance of first affection cast 
 
 Upon their youth's smooth current, as it pass'd ! 
 
 7. But earthlier happy is the rose distill'd, 
 
 Than that which, withering on the virgin-thorn, 
 Grows, lives, and dies, in single blessedness. 
 
 Misfortune. — 
 
 8. . Then was I as a tree, 
 
 Whose boughs did bend with fruit : but, in one night, 
 A storm, or robbery, call it what you will, 
 Shook down my mellow hangings, nay, my leaves, 
 And left me bare to weather. 
 
 I shall fall 
 
 Like a bright exhalation in the evening, 
 And no man see me more. 
 
 9. This is the state of man ; To-day he puts forth 
 The tender leaves of hope ; to-morrow blossoms ; 
 And bears his blushing honours thick upon him : 
 The third day, comes a frost, a killing frost ; 
 And, — when he thinks, good easy man, full surely 
 His greatness is a-ripening, — nips his root, 
 
 And then he falls, as I do. 
 
 4. Dr. Trench's Household Book of Poetry ; Anon. p. 5. 
 5. Marmion, c. vi. 6. Lalla Rookh. 7. Midsummer Night's 
 Dream. 8. Cymbeline. 9. King Henry VIIL, Act iii. sc. 2. 
 
202 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Age. — 
 
 i. (Macbeth says) my May of life 
 
 Is fall'n into the sear, the yellow leaf; 
 
 2. What should we speak of, 
 
 When we are as old as you ? When we shall hear 
 The rain and wind beat dark December, how, 
 In this our pinching cave, shall we discourse 
 The freezing hours away ? 
 
 Mind. — 
 
 3. O, full of scorpions is my mind, dear wife ! 
 
 4. Canst thou not minister to a mind diseas'd ; 
 Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow ; 
 Raze out the written troubles of the brain ; 
 And, with some sweet oblivious antidote, 
 Cleanse the foul bosom of that perilous stuff 
 Which weighs upon the heart ? 
 
 Tears. — 
 
 5. one, whose subdu'd eyes, 
 
 Albeit unused to the melting mood, 
 Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees 
 Their med'cinable gum : 
 
 6. Aumerle, thou weep'st ; My tender-hearted cousin ! 
 We'll make foul weather with despised tears ; 
 
 Our sighs, and they, shall lodge the summer corn, 
 And make a dearth in this revolting land. 
 
 7. Let me wipe off this honourable dew, 
 That silverly doth progress on thy cheeks : 
 My heart hath melted at a lady's tears, 
 Being an ordinary inundation ; 
 
 But this effusion of such manly drops, 
 
 This shower, blown up by tempest of the soul, 
 
 Startles mine eyes, and makes me more amaz'd 
 
 Than had I seen the vaulty top of heaven 
 
 Figur'd quite o'er with burning meteors. 
 
 Lift up thy brow, renowned Salisbury, 
 
 And with a great heart heave away this storm : 
 
 Commend these waters to those baby eyes, 
 
 That never saw the giant world enrag'd ; 
 
 Riot. — 
 
 8. His rash fierce blaze of riot cannot last ; 
 For violent fires soon burn out themselves : 
 
 Small showers last long, but sudden storms are short. 
 
 1. 3. 4. Macbeth. 2. Cymbeline. 5. Othello. 6. 8. King 
 Richard II. 7. King John. Act v. sc. 2, 
 
GRIEF, ETC. 203 
 
 Grief. — 
 
 9. Each substance of a grief hath twenty shadows, 
 Which show like grief itself, but are not so : 
 For sorrow's eye, glazed with blinding tears, 
 Divides one thing entire to many objects ; 
 Like perspectives, which, rightly gaz'd upon, 
 Show nothing but confusion ; — ey'd awry, 
 Distinguish form : * * 
 
 {York says) What a tide of woes 
 
 Comes rushing on this woeful land at once ! 
 
 10. G. What is six winters ? they are quickly gone. 
 B. To men in joy; but grief makes one hour ten. 
 
 Content. — 
 
 1. O, my soul's joy ! 
 
 If after every tempest comes such calmness, 
 
 May the winds blow till they have waken'd death ! 
 
 And let the labouring bark climb hills of seas, 
 
 Olympus-high ; and duck again as low 
 
 As hell's from heaven ! If it were now to die, 
 
 'Twere now to be most happy ; for I fear, 
 
 My soul hath her content so absolute, 
 
 That not another comfort like to this 
 
 Succeeds in unknown fate. 
 
 Delight. — 
 
 2. All the bright world's charms seem brighter, 
 
 All the frowns of grief are gone ; 
 Livelier beats my heart — and lighter ; 
 
 Sweeter is my harp's sweet tone. 
 Life's fresh spring is renovated, 
 
 Bliss finds wings of pride and power, 
 Nobler passions are created, 
 
 Being's struggles upward tower : 
 I, a new-born life possessing, 
 Lov'd and loving — bless'd and blessing — 
 
 Darkening thoughts have pass'd away, 
 
 All is new delight and day. 
 
 Station. — 
 
 3. Whate'er the passion, knowledge, fame, or pelf, 
 Not one will change his neighbour with himself. 
 The learn'd is happy nature to explore, 
 
 The fool is happy that he knows no more ; 
 The rich is happy in the plenty given, 
 
 9. 10. King Richard II. 1. Othello, Act ii. sc. 1. 
 2. Bowring's Magyar Poems, (Kisfaludy). 3. Pope's Essay 
 on Man, 
 
204 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 The poor contents him with the care of Heaven. 
 See the blind beggar dance, the cripple sing, 
 The sot a hero, lunatic a king; 
 The starving chemist in his golden views 
 Supremely blest, the poet in his muse. 
 
 Music. — 
 
 4. That strain again ; — it had a dying fall : 
 
 O, it came o'er my ear, like the sweet south, 
 That breathes upon a bank of violets, 
 Stealing, and giving odour. — 
 
 Rage. — 
 
 5. High-stomach'd are they both, and full of ire, 
 In rage deaf as the sea, hasty as fire. 
 
 Cunning. — 
 
 6. look like the innocent flower, 
 
 But be the serpent under it. 
 
 Murder. — 
 
 7. Ere the bat hath flown 
 
 His cloister' d flight ; ere, to black Hecate's summons, 
 The shard-borne beetle, with his drowsy hums, 
 Hath rung night's yawning peal, there shall be done 
 A deed of dreadful note. 
 
 The Past. — 
 
 8. There's not a joy the world can give like that it takes 
 away, 
 
 * * * * 
 
 * -!< >!< jje 
 
 Though wit may flash from fluent lips, and mirth dis- 
 tract the breast, 
 
 Through midnight hours that yield no more their for- 
 mer hope of rest ; 
 
 'Tis but as ivy-leaves around the ruined turret wreathe, 
 
 All green and wildly fresh without, but worn and grey 
 beneath. 
 
 Oh could I feel as I have felt, or be what I have been, 
 Or weep as I could once have wept, o'er many a 
 
 vanished scene; 
 As springs in deserts found seem sweet, all brackish 
 
 though they be, 
 So 'midst the withered waste of life, those tears would 
 
 flow to me. 
 
 4. Twelfth Night. 5. King Richard II. 6. 7. Macbeth, 
 8. Lord Byron's Stanzas for Music. 
 
EXTERNAL AND HUMAN NATURE, ETC. 205 
 
 External and Human Nature. — 
 
 g. Have you seen but a bright lily grow, 
 Before rude hands have touched it ? 
 Have you remarked but the fall o' the snow, 
 Before the soil hath smutched it ? 
 Have you felt the wool of the beaver ? 
 Or swan's down ever ? 
 Or have smelt o' the bud of the briar? 
 Or the nard in the fire? 
 Or have tasted the bag o' the bee ? 
 O so white ! O so soft ! O so sweet is she ! 
 Dying. — 
 
 10. Softly ! she is lying 
 
 With her lips apart : 
 Softly ! she is dying 
 Of a broken heart. 
 
 Whisper ! she is going 
 To her final rest : 
 Whisper ! life is growing 
 Dim within her breast. 
 Gently ! she is sleeping, 
 She has breathed her last : 
 Gently ! while you are weeping, 
 She to Heaven has past. 
 
 Political. 
 War.— 
 
 1. The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold, 
 And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold ; 
 And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea, 
 When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee. 
 Like the leaves of the forest when summer is green, 
 That host with their banners at sunset were seen : 
 Like the leaves of the forest when autumn hath blown, 
 That host on the morrow lay withered and strown. 
 For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast, 
 And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed ; 
 And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill, 
 And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew 
 
 still! 
 And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide, 
 But through it there rolled not the breath of his pride; 
 And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf, 
 And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf. 
 
 9. Ben J onson's Triumph of Charts. 10. C.G.Eastman, 
 A Dirge. 1. Lord Byron, The Destruction of Sennacherib. 
 
2o6 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 And there lay the rider distorted and pale, 
 With the dew on his brow and the rust on his mail ; 
 And the tents were all silent, the banners alone, 
 The lances uplifted, the trumpets unblown : 
 
 And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail, 
 And the idols are broke in the Temple of Baal ; 
 And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword, 
 Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord ! 
 
 Murder. — 
 
 {Duchess of Gloucester says) 
 i*. One vial full of Edward's sacred blood, 
 
 Is crack'd, and all the precious liquor spilt ; 
 One flourishing branch of his most royal root, 
 Is hack'd down, and his summer leaves all faded, 
 By envy's hand, and murder's bloody axe. 
 
 King. — 
 
 2. he is gracious, if he be observed; 
 
 He hath a tear for pity, and a hand 
 Open as day for melting charity : 
 
 being incens'd he's flint ; 
 
 As humorous as winter, and as sudden 
 As flaws congealed in the spring of day. 
 His temper, therefore, must be well observ'd : — 
 Chide him for faults, and do it reverently, 
 When you perceive his blood inclin'd to mirth : 
 But, being moody, give him line and scope ; 
 Till that his passions, like a whale on ground, 
 Confound themselves with working. 
 
 3. Not all the water in the rough rude sea 
 Can wash the balm from an anointed king ; 
 The breath of worldly men cannot depose 
 The deputy elected by the Lord. 
 
 Civil War. — 
 
 4. Glad am I, that your highness is so arm'd 
 To bear the tidings of calamity. 
 
 Like an unseasonable stormy day, 
 
 Which makes the silver rivers drown their shores, 
 
 As if the world were all dissolved to tears ; 
 
 So high above his limits swells the rage 
 
 Of Bolingbroke, covering your fearful land 
 
 With hard bright steel, and hearts harder than steel. 
 
 1*, 3, 4. King Richard II. 2. King Henry IV. 
 2nd Part. 
 
20 
 
 5. The caterpillars of the commonwealth, 
 Which I have sworn to weed, and pluck away. 
 
 6. But, lords, we hear this fearful tempest sing, 
 Yet seek no shelter to avoid the storm : 
 We see the wind sit sore upon our sails, 
 And yet we strike not, but securely perish. 
 
 7. Ah, Richard ! with the eyes of heavy mind 
 I see thy glory, like a shooting star, 
 
 Fall to the base earth from the firmament ! 
 Thy sun sets weeping in the lowly west, 
 Witnessing storms to come, woe, and unrest : 
 Thy friends are fled, to wait upon thy foes ; 
 And crossly to thy good all fortune goes. 
 
 8. If not, I'll use the advantage of my power, 
 
 And lay the summer's dust with showers of blood 
 Rain'd from the wounds of slaughter'd Englishmen 
 (But far from Bolingbroke's desire that) 
 
 such crimson tempest should bedrench 
 
 The fresh green lap of fair king Richard's land. 
 
 9. Go, while here we march 
 
 Upon the grassy carpet of this plain. — 
 
 Methinks, king Richard and myself should meet 
 With no less terror than the elements 
 Of fire and water, when their thund'ring shock 
 At meeting tears the cloudy cheeks of heaven. 
 Be he the fire, I'll be the yielding water: 
 The rage be his, whilst on the earth I rain 
 My waters ; on the earth and not on him. 
 
 King Richard. — 
 
 1. See, see, king Richard doth himself appear, 
 As doth the blushing discontented sun 
 From out the fiery portal of the east ; 
 When he perceives, the envious clouds are bent 
 To dim his glory, and to stain the tract 
 Of his bright passage to the Occident. 
 Yet looks he like a king ; behold, his eye, 
 As bright as is the eagle's, lightens forth 
 Controlling majesty: 
 
 (His Sceptre) 
 2. well we know, no hand of blood and bone 
 
 Can gripe the sacred handle of our sceptre. 
 
 *• * * * 
 
 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 1, 2, King Richard II. 
 
208 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 He (Bolingbroke) is come to ope 
 
 The purple testament of bleeding war ; 
 
 (His crown.) 
 
 3. Now is this golden crown like a deep well, 
 That owes two buckets, filling one another ; 
 The emptier ever dancing in the air, 
 
 The other down, unseen, and full of water : 
 The bucket down, and full of tears, am I, 
 Drinking my griefs, whilst you mount up on high. 
 
 (His grief.) 
 
 4. Oh, that I were a mockery king of snow, 
 Standing before the sun of Bolingbroke, 
 To melt myself away in water-drops ! — 
 
 (Exton having slain the king, Bolingbroke says) 
 
 5. Lords, I protest, my soul is full of woe, 
 
 That blood should sprinkle me to make me grow : 
 
 Fitz-James. — 
 
 6. Still at the gallop prick'd the Knight, 
 His merry-men follow'd as they might. 
 Along thy banks, swift Teith ! they ride, 
 And in the race they mock thy tide ; 
 Torry and Lendrick now are past, 
 
 And Deanstown lies behind them cast ; 
 They rise, the banner'd towers of Doune, 
 They sink in distant woodland soon ; 
 Blair-Drummond sees the hoofs strike fire, 
 They sweep like breeze through Ochtertyre ; 
 They mark just glance and disappear 
 The lofty brow of ancient Kier ; 
 They bathe their coursers' sweltering sides, 
 Dark Forth ! amid thy sluggish tides, 
 And on the opposing shore take ground, 
 With plash, with scramble, and with bound. 
 Right-hand they leave thy cliffs, Craig-Forth ! 
 And soon the bulwark of the North, 
 Grey Stirling, with her towers and town, 
 Upon their fleet career look'd down. 
 
 King James. — 
 
 7. The monarch's form was middle size ; 
 For feat of strength, or exercise, 
 
 3, 4, 5, King Richard II. 6. Scott's Lady of the 
 Lake. 7. Marmion, c. v. 
 
209 
 
 A Mob. 
 
 Shaped in proportion fair ; 
 And hazel was his eagle eye, 
 And auburn of the darkest dye, 
 
 His short curl'd beard and hair. 
 Light was his footstep in the dance, 
 
 And firm his stirrup in the lists ; 
 And, oh ! he had that merry glance, 
 
 That seldom lady's heart resists. 
 Lightly from fair to fair he flew, 
 And loved to plead, lament, and sue ; — 
 Suit lightly won, and short-lived pain, 
 For monarchs seldom sigh in vain. 
 
 He that trusts to you, 
 
 Where he should find you lions, finds you hares ; 
 Where foxes, geese : You are no surer, no, 
 Than is the coal of fire upon the ice, 
 Or hailstone in the sun. 
 
 Checks. — 
 
 9. checks and disasters 
 
 Grow in the veins of actions, highest rear'd ; 
 As knots by the conflux of meeting sap, 
 Infect the sound pine, and divert his grain 
 Tortive and errant from his course of growth. 
 
 With every effort to abridge our selection of 
 poetical illustrations of studies of Human Nature, 
 it has assumed a somewhat formidable appear- 
 ance, from its affording the chief topic of all 
 poetry. We have only to take Ayscough's index 
 to Shakspeare's dramas to make this obvious by 
 turning to 'man,' giving upwards of 80 lines 
 of references ; ' woman,' above 60 lines ; ' wife,' 
 28; 'widow,' 14; 'the passion of love,' above 
 280 lines, and so on. One such dramatist would 
 alone afford abundant examples of variety in 
 subjects, if not equally so in modes of treatment. 
 
 In treating of Human Nature, we may remark 
 
 8. Coriolanus, Act i. sc. 1. 9. Troihis and Cressida. 
 
 P 
 
2 I O NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 that in 1633 Phineas Fletcher published his singu- 
 lar poem entitled The Purple Island^ or the Isle of 
 Ma?i, in which he sings the anatomy of the 
 human frame in metaphorical language, delivered 
 in a very pedantic style ; yet some bibliopolists 
 have affected to find in his performance lines 
 that would match with many in Spenser or 
 Milton. 
 
 So far as we have proceeded, whether in 
 descriptive poetry of animate or inanimate Nature, 
 or of Human Nature singly, it is observable 
 that the imagination and fancy have been com- 
 paratively tethered ; it is therefore necessary 
 that we should now pursue a more airy, pleas- 
 ing, and gratifying path in our range among 
 poetical literature. 
 
211 
 
 Chapter VIII. 
 
 Meditative, and religious, moral, or serious poetry; an- 
 cient Hebrew poetry ; the Old Testament ; Wordsworth 
 on universal Nature ; prose examples ; illustrative poeti- 
 cal selections ; remarks on the adopted arrangement. 
 
 In classifying poetical compositions we find a 
 style which is neither truly descriptive nor yet 
 purely imaginative : even when apostrophizing 
 Nature, forming associations with it ; or calling 
 it in aid for comparison, reflection, or meditation. 
 Such pieces are, therefore, generally written in 
 more of a grave than a lively turn of expression, 
 well suited for sacred poems, elegies, epitaphs, 
 and all serious forms of odes, sonnets, or songs. 
 This style is characteristic of Hebrew poetry, 
 its essential outlines being, as observed by 
 Herder :* its cosmology, the most ancient con- 
 ceptions of God, of Providence, of Angels, of 
 the Elohim, and of the Cherubim, and individual 
 objects, and poetical representations of Nature. 
 In the Old Testament we find a rich interchange 
 of figurative representation, of characters, and 
 of scenery. As in Isaiah, employing the bold 
 imagery — 
 
 Heaven is my throne. 
 The earth my footstool. 
 
 The intermediate style of which we are 
 
 * See The Spirit of Hebrew Poetry. By J. G. Herder. 
 Translated by J. Marsh, 2 vols. 8vo. Burlington, 1833. 
 
 P 2 
 
2 I 2 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 treating is fully exemplified in Wordsworth's 
 poetry, of which we shall but give the following 
 example, from the fourth book of The Excur- 
 sion : — 
 
 Happy is he who lives to understand, 
 Not human nature only, but explores 
 All natures, — to the end that he may find 
 The law that governs each ; and where begins 
 The union, the partition where, that makes 
 Kind and degree, among all visible Beings ; 
 The constitutions, powers, and faculties, 
 Which they inherit — cannot step beyond, — 
 And cannot fall beneath ; that do assign 
 To every class its station and its office, 
 Through all the mighty commonwealth of things ; 
 Up from the creeping plant to sovereign Man. 
 Such converse, if directed by a meek, 
 Sincere, and humble spirit, teaches love : 
 For knowledge is delight ; and such delight 
 Breeds love : yet, suited as it rather is 
 To thought and to the climbing intellect, 
 It teaches less to love, than to adore ; 
 If that be not indeed the highest love ! 
 
 Cottle, in his Reminiscences of S. T. Coleridge, 
 1 847, quotes a passage written by the poet in 
 1807, which reaches the poetical in concep- 
 tion : — 
 
 I recollect when I stood on the summit of Etna, and 
 darted my gaze down the crater; the immediate vicinity 
 was discernible, till, lower down, obscurity gradually ter- 
 minated in total darkness. Such figures exemplify many 
 truths revealed in the Bible. We pursue them, until, from 
 the imperfection of our faculties, we are lost in impene- 
 trable night. 
 
 In a very unlikely work in which to find any 
 similar apposite association with Nature, namely, 
 Alison's History of Europe, the following pas- 
 sage occurs at the close of the introduction : — 
 
 It is by slow degrees, and imperceptible additions, that 
 all the great changes of nature are accomplished. Vegeta- 
 tion, commencing with lichens, swells to the riches and 
 
ASSOCIATION. 2 I 3 
 
 luxuriance of the forest ; continents, the seat of empires and 
 the abode of millions, are formed from the deposits of innu- 
 merable rills ; animal life, springing from the torpid vitality 
 of shell-fish, rises to the energy and power of man. It is by 
 similar steps, and as slow a progress, that the great fabric 
 of society is formed. 
 
 At a recent public meeting on the state of Ire- 
 land, Mr. J. Bright, M.P., took occasion to remark 
 that the censors of the Press had declared that 
 the discussion in parliament would occupy thirty 
 hours of talk, and end in no result ; adding : — 
 
 I have observed that all great questions in this country 
 require thirty hours' talk many times repeated before they 
 are settled. There is much shower and much sunshine 
 between the sowing of the seed and the reaping of the 
 harvest ; but the harvest is reaped after all. 
 
 The annexed prose and poetical illustrations 
 expressly apply to the present division of our 
 subject. 
 
 Apostrophe. 
 
 Moon. — 
 
 1. Daughter of heaven, fair art thou! the silence of thy 
 face is pleasant : thou comest forth in loveliness ; the 
 stars attend thy blue steps in the east. The clouds re- 
 joice in thy presence, O Moon ! and brighten their dark- 
 brown sides. Who is like thee in heaven, daughter of 
 the night ? The stars are ashamed in thy presence, and 
 turn aside their sparkling eyes. Whither dost thou 
 retire from thy course, when the darkness of thy coun- 
 tenance grows ? Hast thou thy hall, like Ossian ? 
 Dwellest thou in the shadow of grief? • Have thy sisters 
 fallen from Heaven ? and are they who rejoiced with 
 thee at night no more ? — Yes, they have fallen, fair light ! 
 and often dost thou retire to mourn. — But thou thyself 
 shalt one night fail, and leave thy blue path in heaven. 
 The stars will then lift their heads ; they who in thy 
 presence were astonished will rejoice. 
 
 1. Ossian's Poems. 
 
2 1 4 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Trees, &c. — 
 
 2. Ye trees that make so sweet a shade, 
 
 Bend down your waving heads, when he, 
 The youth ye honour, through your glade, 
 
 Comes on love's messages to me. 
 Ye stars, that shine o'er heaven's blue deep, 
 
 And all its arch with glory fill, 
 O wake him, wake him from his sleep, 
 
 If that dear youth is slumbering still. 
 
 Mountains, &c. — 
 
 3. Ye towering mountains upon mountains pil'd, 
 Rocks upon rocks up to the clouded sky, 
 Build me a temple on your summits high, 
 Whence I may reach that angel, far exil'd. 
 Ye towering mountains upon mountains pil'd ! 
 
 Ye gathering streams that, through your beds 
 
 beguil'd, 
 Roll thundering to the ocean's majesty, 
 Singing loud anthems as ye hasten by — 
 Bear these, my tears, uncheck'd and undefil'd. 
 Ye gathering streams to ocean's depths that hie ! 
 Ye winds, ye breezes, wherefore are ye still ? 
 Freshen and bear my sighs to her high throne : 
 Take pity — hasten — and my prayers fulfil — 
 Ye. winds, ye breezes, wherefore are ye still ? 
 Waft me to her, seraphic messengers, 
 Or her to me — nor let me pine alone ; 
 For what are clouds, or storms, or ghostly fears ? 
 Waft me to her, seraphic messengers ! 
 
 Heaven. — 
 
 4. . But if there be 
 
 Yet left in heaven as small a drop of pity 
 As a wren's eye, fear'd gods, a part of it ! 
 
 Nature. — 
 
 5. Urania ! Nature ! from thy heights descend, 
 And low to earth thy bright irradiance bend, 
 Dispel the clouds, that round our fancy stray ; 
 The mist, that damps our intellectual ray ; 
 
 And show what Pow'r, all height of Power transcends, 
 And in one act, performs ten thousand ends. 
 
 2. Bowring's Poetry of Spain (the Maiden waiting her 
 Lover. Anonymous, 1595.) 3. Bowring's Poetical Literature 
 of Bohemia, (Sonnet 102, from John Kollar's Slawy 
 Deera.) 4. Cymbeline. 5. Henry Brooke's Universal 
 Beauty, fol. 1735. 
 
ETC. 215 
 
 6. Nature, great parent, whose unceasing hand 
 Rolls round the Seasons of the changeful year, 
 How mighty, how majestic, are thy works! 
 With what a pleasing dread they swell the soul, 
 That sees astonished, and astonished sings ! 
 Ye too, ye winds, that now begin to blow, 
 With boisterous sweep, I raise my voice to you. 
 Where are your stores, ye powerful beings^ say ; 
 Where your aerial magazines, reserved 
 
 To swell the brooding terrors of the storm ; 
 
 In what far-distant region of the sky, 
 
 Hushed in deep silence, sleep ye when 'tis calm ? 
 
 Winds. — 
 
 7. O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being, 
 Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead 
 Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing 
 Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red, 
 Pestilence-stricken multitudes : O thou, 
 
 Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed 
 
 The winged seeds ■ 
 
 sjs ^;< . % % 
 
 Martial Faith. — 
 
 8. Fair as the earliest beam of eastern light, 
 
 When first, by the bewilder'd pilgrim spied, 
 It smiles upon the dreary brow of night, 
 
 And silvers o'er the torrent's foaming tide, 
 And lights the fearful path on mountain side ; — 
 
 Fair as that beam, although the fairest far, 
 Giving to horror grace, to danger pride, 
 
 Shine martial Faith, and Courtesy's bright star, 
 Through all the wreckful storms that cloud the brow 
 of War. 
 
 Mountains, &c. — 
 
 9. Ye mountains stern ! within whose rugged breast 
 
 The friends of Scottish freedom found repose 
 Ye torrents ! whose hoarse sounds have soothed their 
 rest, 
 
 Returning from the field of vanquish'd foes ; 
 Say, have ye lost each wild majestic close, 
 
 That erst the choir of Bards or Druids flung, 
 What time their hymn of victory arose, 
 
 6. Thomson's Seasons (Winter). 7. Shelley's Ode to 
 the West Wind. 8. Scott's Lady of the Lake, c. v. 
 
 9. Vision of Don Roderick, iv. 
 
2 1 6 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 And Cattraeth's glens with voice of triumph rung, 
 And mystic Merlin harp'd, and grey-hair'd Llywarch 
 sung ! 
 
 Association. 
 
 Leaf. — 
 
 Like the leaf, 
 
 That bows its lithe top till the blast is blown ; 
 By its own virtue rear'd then stands aloof; 
 So I. 
 
 Fire. — 
 
 2. And sure as smoke doth indicate a flame, 
 
 3. Every deed that a man doth shall not be concealed : 
 Did any one tell thee to kindle a lire, and make no 
 
 smoke ? 
 
 Alps. — 
 
 4. Like unto these unmeasurable mountaines 
 So is my painful life, the burden of ire ; 
 For high be they, and high is my desire ; 
 And I of tears, and they be full of fountaines : 
 Under craggy rocks they have barren plaines ; 
 Harde thoughts in me my woful minde doth tire ; 
 Small fruit and many leaves their tops do attire, 
 With small effect great trust in me remains : 
 
 The boisterous winds oft their high boughs do blast ; 
 Hot sighs in me continually be shed : 
 Wild beasts in them, fierce love in me is fed ; 
 Unmoveable am I, and they stedfast. 
 
 Of singing birds they have the tune and note ; 
 
 And I alwaies plaintes passingthrough my throat. 
 
 Autumn. — 
 
 5. That time of year thou may'st in me behold, 
 When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang 
 Upon those boughs which shake against the cold, 
 Bare, ruined choirs, where late the sweet birds sang. 
 In me thou seest the twilight of such day, 
 
 As after sun-set fadeth in the west, 
 
 Which by-and-bye black night doth take away, 
 
 Death's second self, and seals up all in rest. 
 
 1. Gary's Dante (Paradise), c. xxvi. 2. Ibid. (Purga- 
 tory), xxxiii. 3. Raverty's Afghan Poetry. 4. Sir T. 
 Wiat, A Lover's Life compared to the Alps. 5. Shakspeare's 
 Sonnets. 
 
NATURE, ETC. 217 
 
 Nature. — 
 
 6. 'Tis night, and the landscape is lovely no more : 
 
 I mourn ; but, ye woodlands, I mourn not for you ; 
 For morn is approaching, your charms to restore, 
 
 Perfum'd with fresh fragrance, and glitt'ring with 
 dew. 
 Nor yet for the ravage of Winter I mourn ; 
 
 Kind Nature the embryo-blossom shall save : 
 But when shall Spring visit the mouldering urn ! 
 
 O when shall it dawn on the night of the grave ! 
 
 Blue. — 
 
 7. I've looked into the dark blue sea, 
 I've trusted to the deep blue sea ; 
 A sky lay mirror'd bright therein, 
 
 And twinkling stars and moonlight sheen ; 
 But sadly did it 'fall ; — 
 
 For when to the deep sea I flew, 
 
 I found therein no sky of blue, 
 But wild waves to appal. — 
 'Twas treachery, falsehood, all ! 
 
 I've looked unto the bright blue sky, 
 
 I've trusted to the bright blue sky ; 
 
 It glanced so pure, it gleamed so fair, 
 
 A golden sun was rising there ; 
 But sadly did it 'fall ; — 
 
 The sun that burned so hot and proud, 
 
 Around me many a thunder-cloud 
 And lightning-flash did call. — 
 'Twas treachery, falsehood, all ! 
 
 I've look'd into two bright blue eyes ; 
 
 I've trusted those two bright blue eyes ; 
 
 They seemed so clear, and pure, and young, 
 
 I gazed thereon in raptures long; 
 But sadly did it 'fall , — 
 
 Their lightsome glance was angry glare, 
 
 A tossing flood their mirror fair, 
 That did my soul enthral. — 
 'Twas treachery, falsehood, all ! 
 
 Action. — 
 
 8. The water it rushes, 
 
 And never will stay ; 
 
 6. Beattie, The Hermit. 7. Dulcken's German Songs, 
 (False Blue. Reinick .) 8. Ibid. (The water it rushes. 
 Goethe.) 
 
2 I 8 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 The stars through the sky 
 
 Wend so gaily their way ; 
 
 The clouds through the heavens 
 So merrily glide — 
 
 Thus love rushes onward, 
 And ne'er may abide. 
 
 Answer. 
 
 The waters rush onward, 
 
 The cloudlets pass by ; 
 But the stars go not from us, — 
 
 They stay, though they fly : 
 Of love that is loyal 
 
 The like we may say ; 
 It heaves and it rushes, 
 
 Yet fades not away. 
 
 Poplars. — 
 
 9. The poplars are fell'd, farewell to the shade 
 
 And the whispering sound of the cool colonnade ; 
 The winds play no longer and sing in the leaves, 
 Nor Ouse on his bosom their image receives. 
 
 Short lived as we are, our enjoyments, I see 
 Have a still shorter date, and die sooner than we. 
 
 Rose. — 
 
 1. ' The rose is fairest when 'tis budding new, 
 
 And hope is brightest when it dawns from fears ; 
 The rose is sweetest wash'd with morning dew, 
 And love is loveliest when embalm'd in tears. 
 O wilding rose, whom fancy thus endears, 
 I bid your blossoms in my bonnet wave, 
 Emblem of hope and love through future years !' — 
 Thus spoke young Norman, heir of Armandave, 
 What time the sun arose on Vennachar's broad wave. 
 
 Daisy. — 
 
 2. Thrice welcome, little English flower ! 
 
 To this resplendent hemisphere, 
 Where Flora's giant-offspring tower 
 
 In gorgeous liveries all the year : 
 Thou, only thou, art little here, 
 
 Like worth unfriended or unknown, 
 Yet to my British heart more dear 
 
 Than all the torrid zone. 
 
 9. Cowper, The Poplar Field. 1. Lady of the Lake, c. iv. 
 2. Montgomery, The Daisy in India. 
 
THISTLE, ETC. 219 
 
 Thistle. — 
 
 3. The rough burr-thissle, spreading wide 
 
 Amang the bearded bear, 
 I turn'd the weeder-clips aside, 
 And spared the symbol dear : 
 
 Change. — 
 
 4. Like April morning clouds, that pass, 
 With varying shadow, o'er the grass, 
 And imitate, on field and furrow, 
 
 Life's chequer'd scenes of joy and sorrow ; 
 
 Like streamlet of the mountain north, 
 
 Now in a torrent racing forth, 
 
 Now winding slow in silver train, 
 
 And almost slumbering on the plain ; 
 
 Like breezes of the Autumn day, 
 
 Whose voice inconstant dies away, 
 
 And ever swells again as fast, 
 
 When the ear deems its murmur past ; 
 
 Thus various, my romantic theme 
 
 Flits, winds, or sinks, a morning dream. 
 
 Yet pleased, our eye pursues the trace 
 
 Of Light and Shade's inconstant race ; 
 
 Pleased, view the rivulet afar, 
 
 Weaving its maze irregular ; 
 
 And pleased, we listen as the breeze 
 
 Heaves its wild sigh through Autumn trees : 
 
 Then, wild as cloud, or stream, or gale, 
 
 Flow on, flow unconfined, my Tale ! 
 
 Moonlight. — 
 
 5. The Moon is in her summer glow, 
 But hoarse and high the breezes blow, 
 And, racking o'er her face, the cloud 
 Varies the tincture of her shroud ; 
 
 On Barnard's towers, and Tees's stream ; 
 She changes as a guilty dream, 
 When Conscience, with remorse and fear, 
 Goads sleeping Fancy's wild career, 
 Her light seems now the blush of shame, 
 Seems now fierce anger's darker flame, 
 Shifting that shade, to come and go, 
 Like apprehension's hurried glow ; 
 Then sorrow's livery dims the air, 
 And dies in darkness, like despair. 
 
 3. Burns' Poems. 4. Marmion, c. iii. 5. Rokeby, c. i. 
 
2 20 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Such varied hues the warder sees, 
 
 Reflected from the woodland Tees, 
 
 * * * 
 
 Hears, upon turret-roof and wall, 
 By fits the plashing rain-drop fall. 
 Snow. — 
 
 6. It will not melt, like man, to time ; 
 Tj^rant and slave are swept away, 
 Less form'd to wear before the ray ; 
 But that white veil, the lightest, frailest, 
 Which on the mighty mount thou hailest, 
 While tower and tree are torn and rent, 
 Shines o'er its craggy battlement ; 
 
 In form a peak, in height a cloud, 
 In texture like a hovering shroud. 
 Bright scene. — 
 
 7. Yet it was not that Nature had shed o'er the scene 
 Her purest of crystal and brightest of green ; 
 'Twas not her soft magic of streamlet or hill, 
 
 Oh ! no — it was something more exquisite still, 
 'Twas that friends, the belov'd of my bosom, were near. 
 A Pass. — 
 
 8. There's not a nook within this solemn Pass 
 But were an apt confessional for One 
 Taught by his summer spent, his autumn gone, 
 That life is but a tale of morning grass 
 Withered at eve. 
 
 Sounds. — 
 
 9. Two voices are there ; one is of the Sea, 
 One of the Mountains ; each a mighty voice : 
 
 (Liberty) what sorrow would it be 
 That Mountain floods should thunder as before, 
 And Ocean bellow from his rocky shore, 
 And neither awful Voice be heard by Thee ! 
 Human Nature. — 
 
 1. Three years she grew in sun and shower; 
 Then Nature said, ' A lovelier flower 
 On earth was never sown : 
 This child I to myself will take ; 
 She shall be mine, and I will make 
 A lady of my own. 
 
 6. Byron's Siege of Corinth. 7. Moore's Irish Melodies 
 {Meeting of the Waters). 8. Wordsworth's Sonnets, The 
 Trosachs. 9. Ibid., England and Switzerland. 1. Ibid., 
 The Education of Nature. 
 
HUMAN NATURE, ETC. 22 1 
 
 Myself will to my darling be 
 
 Both law and impulse : and with me 
 
 The girl, in rock and plain 
 
 In earth and heaven, in glade and bower 
 
 Shall feel an overseeing power 
 
 To kindle or restrain. 
 
 She shall be sportive as the fawn 
 That wild with glee across the lawn 
 Or up the mountain springs ; 
 And her's shall be the breathing balm, 
 And her's the silence and the calm 
 Of mute insensate things. 
 
 The floating clouds their state shall lend 
 
 To her ; for her the willow bend ; 
 
 Nor shall she fail to see 
 
 E'en in the motions of the storm 
 
 Grace that shall mould the maiden's form 
 
 By silent sympathy. 
 
 The stars of midnight shall be dear 
 
 To her; and she shall lean her ear 
 
 In many a secret place 
 
 Where rivulets dance their wayward round, 
 
 And beauty born of murmuring sound 
 
 Shall pass into her face.' 
 
 Graveyard. — 
 
 2. Where Claribel low-lieth 
 
 The breezes pause and die, 
 Letting the rose-leaves fall : 
 But the solemn oak-tree sigheth, 
 Thick-leaved, ambrosial, 
 With an ancient melody 
 Of an inward agony, 
 Where Claribel low-lieth. 
 
 At eve the beetle boometh 
 
 Athwart the thicket lone : 
 At noon the wild bee hummeth 
 
 About the moss'd headstone : 
 At midnight the moon cometh, 
 
 And looketh down alone. 
 
 Her song the lintwhite swelleth, 
 The clear-voiced mavis dwelleth, 
 
 2. Tennyson's Poems, Claribel. 
 
2 22 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 The callow throstle lispeth 
 The slumbrous wave out-welleth, 
 
 The babbling runnel crispeth 
 The hollow grot replieth 
 Where Claribel low-lieth. 
 
 [A Dirge. Each verse alluding to subjects as follows : ] 
 
 3. Shadows of the silver birk 
 
 Sweep the green that folds thy grave. 
 
 Light and shadow ever wander 
 O'er the green that folds thy grave. 
 
 Chaunteth not the brooding bee 
 Sweeter tones than calumny ? 
 
 The woodbine and eglatere 
 
 Drip sweeter dews than traitor's tear. 
 
 Rain makes music in the tree 
 O'er the green that folds thy grave. 
 
 Round thee blow, self-pleached deep, 
 Bramble-roses, faint and pale, 
 And long purples of the dale. 
 
 The gold-eyed kingcups fine ; 
 The frail bluebell peereth over 
 Rare broidery of the purple clover. 
 
 The balm-cricket carols clear 
 
 In the green that folds thy grave. 
 
 Wing. — 
 
 4. ignorance is the curse of God, 
 
 Knowledge the wing wherewith we fly to heaven. 
 
 Groves. — 
 
 5. Yet once more, O ye laurels, and once more, 
 Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never-sere, 
 I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude ; 
 And, with forced fingers rude, 
 Shatter your leaves before the mellowing year : 
 
 As killing as the canker to the rose, 
 
 Or taint-worm to the weanling herds that graze, 
 
 Or frost to flowers, that their gay wardrobe wear, 
 
 When first the white-thorn blows ; 
 
 Such, Lycidas, thy loss to shepherd's ear, 
 
 Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil, 
 
 3. Tennyson's Poems, A Dirge; 4. King Henry IV., 
 2nd Part. 5. Milton's Lycidas. 
 

 GROVES. 223 
 
 return, Sicilian Muse, 
 
 And call the vales, and bid them hither cast 
 
 Their bells, and flowrets of a thousand hues. 
 
 Ye valleys low, where the mild whispers use 
 
 Of shades, and wanton winds, and gushing brooks, 
 
 On whose fresh lap the swart-star sparely looks, 
 
 Throw hither all your quaint enamelled eyes, 
 
 That on the green turf suck the honied showers, 
 
 And purple all the ground with vernal flowers. 
 
 Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies, 
 
 The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine, 
 
 The white pink, and the pansy freaked with jet, 
 
 The glowing violet, 
 
 The musk-rose, and the well-attired woodbine, 
 
 With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head, 
 
 And every flower that sad embroidery wears : 
 
 Bid amaranthus all his beauty shed, 
 
 And daffodillies fill their cups with tears, 
 
 To strew the laureat hearse where Lycid lies. 
 
 Lycidas- 
 
 Sunk though he be beneath the watery floor ; 
 
 So sinks the day-star in the ocean-bed, 
 
 And yet anon repairs his drooping head, 
 
 And tricks his beams, and with new-spangled ore 
 
 Flames in the forehead of the morning sky : 
 
 Thus sang the uncouth swain to the oaks and rills, 
 While the still Morn went out with sandals gray ; 
 
 And now the sun had stretched out all the hills, 
 And now was dropt into the western bay ; 
 At last he rose, and twitched his mantle blue ; 
 To-morrow to fresh woods and pastures new. 
 
 Morning, &c. — 
 
 6. In vain to me the smiling mornings shine, 
 And reddening Phoebus lifts his golden fire, 
 The birds in vain their amorous descant join, 
 Or cheerful fields resume their green attire. 
 These ears, alas ! for other notes repine, 
 A different object do these eyes require ; 
 
 6. T. Gray, On the Death of R. West. 
 
2 24 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 My lonely anguish melts no heait but mine, 
 And in my breast the imperfect joys expire; 
 Yet morning smiles the busy race to cheer, 
 And new-born pleasure brings to happier men ; 
 The fields to all their wonted tribute bear, 
 To warm their little loves the birds complain ; 
 I fruitless mourn to him that cannot hear, 
 And weep the more, because I weep in vain. 
 
 The East. — 
 
 7. If to fair India's coast we sail, 
 
 Thy eyes are seen in diamonds bright, 
 Thy breath in Afric's spicy gale, 
 
 Thy skin is ivory so white. 
 Thus every beautous object that I view 
 Wakes in my soul some charm of lovely Sue. 
 
 Comparative. 
 Deity. — 
 
 8. Bless the Lord, O my soul. O Lord my God, thou art 
 
 very great ; thou art clothed with honour and majesty. 
 
 Who coverest thyself with light as with a garment : 
 who stretchest out the heavens like a curtain : 
 
 Who layeth the beams of his chambers in the waters : 
 who maketh the clouds his chariot : who walketh 
 upon the wings of the wind : 
 
 Who maketh his angels spirits ; his ministers a flam- 
 ing fire : 
 
 Who laid the foundations of the earth, that it should 
 not be removed for ever. 
 
 He looketh on the earth, and it trembleth : be toucheth 
 the hills and they smoke. 
 
 9. O thou unutterable Potentate ! 
 
 Through nature's vast extent sublimely great ! 
 Thy lovely form the flower-decked field discloses. 
 Thy smiles are seen in nature's sunny face : 
 Milk-coloured lilies and wild blushing roses 
 Are bright with Thee : — Thy voice of gentleness 
 Speaks in the light-winged whispering zephyrs playing 
 Midst the young boughs, or o'er the meadows straying: 
 Thy breath gives life to all ; below, above, 
 And all things revel in Thy light and love. 
 
 7. John Gay's Black-eyed Susan. 8. Psalm civ. 
 
 9. Bowring's Russian Poets (Bobrov's Address to the Deity.) 
 
DEITY, ETC. 225 
 
 But here, on these gigantic mountains, here 
 
 Thy greatness, glory, wisdom, strength, and spirit, 
 
 In terrible sublimity appear ; 
 
 Thy awe-imposing voice is heard, — we hear it ! 
 
 Th' Almighty's fearful voice ; attend, it breaks 
 
 The silence, and in solemn warnings speaks : 
 
 His the light tones that whisper midst the trees ; 
 
 His, his the whistling of the busy breeze ; 
 
 His, the storm-thunder roaring, rattling round, 
 
 When element with element makes war 
 
 Amidst the echoing mountains : on whose bound, 
 
 Whose highest bound he drives his fiery car 
 
 Glowing like molten iron ; or enshrin'd 
 
 In robes of darkness, riding on the wind 
 
 Across the clouded vault of heaven : — 
 
 1. God moves in a mysterious way 
 
 His wonders to perform ; 
 He plants his footsteps in the sea, 
 
 And rides upon the storm. 
 Deep in unfathomable mines 
 
 Of never-failing skill, 
 He treasures up his bright designs, 
 
 And works his sovereign will. 
 Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take, 
 
 The clouds ye so much dread 
 Are big with mercy, and shall break 
 
 In blessings on your head. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 * * •* # 
 The bud may have a bitter taste, 
 
 But sweet will be the flower. 
 Nature. — 
 
 2. Now day conceals her face, and darkness fills 
 The field, the forest, with the shades of night ; 
 The gloomy clouds are gathering round the hills, 
 Veiling the last ray of the lingering light, 
 
 The abyss of heaven appears — the stars are kindling 
 
 round ; 
 Who, who can count those stars, who that abyss can 
 
 sound ? 
 Just as a sand 'whelm'd in the infinite sea ; 
 A ray the frozen iceberg sends to heaven ; 
 A feather in the fierce flame's majesty ; 
 A mote, by midnight's maddened whirlwind driven, 
 
 1. Cowper, Psalm xcvii. 2. Bowring's Russian Poets 
 (Lomonsov's Evening Reflections.) 
 
2 26 " NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Am I, midst this parade : an atom, less than nought, 
 Lost and o'erpower'd by the gigantic thought. 
 * * * * 
 
 Where are thy secret laws, O nature, where ? 
 Thy north-lights dazzle in the wintry zone : 
 How dost thou light from ice thy torches there ? 
 There has thy sun some sacred, secret throne ? 
 See in yon frozen seas what glories have their birth ; 
 Thence night leads forth the day to illuminate the earth. 
 #• * * * 
 
 Who can reach or read yon milky way ? 
 
 Creation's heights and depths are all unknown — un- 
 
 trod— 
 Who then shall say how vast, how great creation's 
 
 God? 
 
 Time. — 
 
 3. The country cocks do crow ; the clocks do toll, 
 And the third hour of drowsy morning name. 
 
 And chide the cripple tardy-gaited night, 
 
 doth limp 
 
 So tediously away. 
 
 4. Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea, 
 But sad mortality o'er-sways their power, 
 
 How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea, 
 Whose action is no stronger than a flower? 
 O how shall summer's honey breath hold out 
 Against the wreckful siege of battering days, 
 When rocks impregnable are not so stout, 
 Nor gates of steel so strong, but time decays ? 
 
 5. Time, stern huntsman ! who can baulk, 
 Stanch as hound, and fleet as hawk; 
 
 Sun.— 
 
 6. Whom love did melt away, as sun the mist, 
 
 7. [Tro.] I was about to tell thee, When my heart, 
 As wedged with a sigh, would rive in twain, 
 
 * * * 
 
 I have (as when the sun doth light a storm) 
 Buried this sigh in wrinkle of a smile : 
 
 8. (Richard says, allusive to the traitorous Bolingbroke : ) 
 
 — when the searching eye of heaven is hid 
 
 3. King Henry V. 4. Shakspeare's Sonnets. 5. Scott's 
 Hunting Song. 6. Cary's Dante, c. xii. 7. Troilus 
 
 and Cressida. 8. King Richard II. 
 
MORNING, ETC. 227 
 
 Behind the globe, that lights the lower world, 
 Then thieves and robbers range abroad unseen, 
 
 But when from under this terrestrial ball, 
 He fires the proud tops of the eastern pines, 
 And darts his light through every guilty hole, 
 Then murders 
 
 Stand bare and naked, trembling at themselves. 
 
 His treasons will sit blushing in his face, 
 Not able to endure the sight of day. 
 
 Morning. — 
 
 9. That hair which shrouds 
 
 Thy form of snow, 
 Is like the clouds 
 On Morning's brow. 
 
 But Morning ne'er, 
 
 In light array'd, 
 Was half so fair 
 
 As that fair maid. 
 
 Wind, Air. — 
 
 1. {The wicked) They are as stubble before the wind, 
 
 and as chaff that the storm carrieth away. 
 
 2. [The wicked) — are like the chaff which the wind 
 
 driveth away. 
 
 3. (The Greeks — in silence moved.) 
 
 As when the south wind o'er the mountain tops 10 
 Spreads a thick veil of mist, the shepherd's bane, 
 But friendlier to the thief than shades of night, 
 That a stone's throw the range of vision bounds; 
 So rose the dust-cloud, as in serried ranks 
 With rapid step they moved across the plain. 15 
 
 4. As by the west wind driven, the ocean waves 
 Dash forward on the far-resounding shore, 
 Wave upon wave ; first curls the ruffled sea 
 With whitening crests ; anon with thundering roar 
 It breaks upon the beach, and from the crags 485 
 Recoiling flings in giant curves its head 
 
 9. Bowring's Poetry of Spain, {The Maid fairer than 
 Morning. Anon. 1644.) 1 Job xxi. 18. 2. Psalm 
 i. 4. 3. Lord Derby's Homer's Iliad, b. iii. 4. Ibid, 
 b. iv. 
 
 Q 2 
 
228 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Aloft, and tosses high the wild sea-spray : 
 
 (so ceaseless poured the hosts of Greece to the war.) 
 
 5. (Trojans and Greeks — keeping watch.) 
 
 As when two stormy winds ruffle the sea, 
 Boreas and Zephyr, from the hills of Thrace 
 With sudden gust descending ; the dark waves 
 Beat high their angry crests, and toss on shore 
 Masses of tangled weed ; such stormy grief 
 Each Grecian breast with thoughts conflicting rent. 
 
 6. as when the west wind drives 
 
 The clouds, and battles with the hurricane, 
 
 Before the clearing blast of Notus driven ; 350 
 
 The big waves heave and roll, and high aloft 
 
 The gale, careering, flings the ocean spray ; 
 So thick and furious fell on hostile heads 
 The might of Hector. 
 
 7. As embers, at the breathing of the wind, 
 Their flame enliven, so that light I saw 
 
 * * grew 
 
 More fair to look on. 
 
 8. Look, as I blow this feather from my face, 
 And as the air blows it to me again, 
 Obeying with my wind when I do blow, 
 And yielding to another when it blows, 
 Commanded always by the greater gust ; 
 Such is the lightness of you common men. 
 
 9. But I was born so high, 
 
 Our aiery [nest] buildeth in the cedar's top, 
 And dallies with the wind, and scorns the sun. 
 
 1. God made 
 
 The firmament, expanse of liquid, pure, 
 Transparent, elemental air, diffused 
 In circuit to the uttermost convex 
 Of this great round. 
 
 2. At length the freshening western blast 
 Aside the shroud of battle cast ; 
 And, first, the ridge of mingled spears 
 Above the brightening cloud appears ; 
 
 5. Lord Derby's Homer's Iliad, b. x. 6. Ibid., b. xi. 
 7. Cary's Dante (Paradise), c. xvi. 8. King Henry VI., 
 3rd Part. 9. King Richard III. 1. Paradise Lost, b. vii. 
 2. Marmion, c. vi. 
 
WATER, ETC. 229 
 
 And in the smoke the pennons flew, 
 As in the storm the white sea-mew. 
 Then mark'd they, dashing broad and far, 
 The broken billows of the war, 
 And plumed crests of chieftains brave, 
 Floating like foam upon the wave ; 
 
 Water. — 
 
 3. — man — drinketh iniquity like water. 
 
 4. (Greeks and Trojans — meet in war.) 
 
 As when, descending from the mountain's brow, 515 
 
 Pour downward to the narrow pass, where meet 
 
 Their mingled waters in some deep ravine, 
 
 Their weight of flood, on the far mountain's side 
 
 The shepherd hears the roar ; so loud arose 
 
 The shouts and yells of those commingling hosts. 520 
 
 5. as a stream, 
 
 Swollen by the rains of Heaven, and from the hills 
 Pours down its wintry torrent to the plain ; 
 
 And many a blighted oak, and many a pine 
 It bears, with piles of drift-wood, to the sea ; 570 
 
 So swept illustrious Ajax o'er the plain, 
 O'erthrowing men and horses ; 
 
 6. Like as the waves towards the pebbled shore, 
 
 So do our minutes hasten to their end ; 
 Each changing place with that which goes before, 
 In sequent toil all forwards do contend. 
 
 Water, &c. — 
 
 7. There are a sort of men, whose visages 
 Do cream and mantle, like a standing pond. 
 
 8. The quality of mercy is not strain'd ; 
 
 It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven 
 Upon the place beneath : 
 
 9. Glory is like a circle in the water, 
 Which never ceaseth to enlarge itself, 
 
 Till, by broad spreading, it disperse to nought. 
 
 1. [Tro.~] There my hopes lie drown'd, 
 
 Reply not in how many fathoms deep 
 They lie indrench'd. 
 
 2. The tear, down childhood's cheek that flows, 
 Is like the dewdrop on the rose ; 
 
 3. Job xv. 16. 4. Lord Derby's Homer's Iliad. 
 5. Ibid., b. xi. 6. Shakspeare's Sonnets. 7, 8. Merchant 
 of Venice, 9. King Henry VI., 1st Part. 1. Troilus and 
 Cressida. 2. Rokeby, c. iv. 11. 
 
230 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 When next the summer breeze comes by, 
 And waves the bush, the flower is dry. 
 
 3. When lovers meet in adverse hour, 
 
 'Tis like a sun-glimpse through a shower, 
 A watery ray, an instant seen 
 The darkly closing clouds between. 
 
 Fish.— 
 
 4. As in a quiet and clear lake the fish, 
 
 If aught approach them from without, do draw 
 Towards it, deeming it their food ; so drew 
 Full more than thousand splendours towards us. 
 
 Rock. — 
 
 5. Hector straight forward urged his furious course. 
 As some huge boulder, from its rock bed 
 Detached, and by the wintry torrent's force 160 
 Hurled down the cliff's steep face, when constant rains 
 The massive rock's firm hold have undermined ; 
 With giant bounds it flies ; the crashing wood 
 Resounds beneath it ; still it hurries on, 
 
 Until, arriving at the level plain, 165 
 
 Its headlong impulse checked, it rolls no more ; 
 So Hector, 
 
 6. I am sunk in care, to this degree, on account of the 
 
 fair, 
 Like unto a stone, submerged at the bottom of Oman's 
 sea. ;,: 
 
 7. I have not seen 
 So likely an ambassador of love : 
 
 A day in April never came so sweet, 
 • To show how costly summer was at hand, 
 As this fore-spurrer comes before his lord. 
 
 Winter. — 
 
 8. His tears run down his beard, like winter's drops 
 From eaves [thatch] of reeds : — 
 
 Trees. — 
 
 9. (The godly man.) And he shall be like a tree planted 
 
 by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in 
 his season. 
 
 3. Scott's Rokeby, c. iv. 17. 4. Cary's Dante (Paradise ) , 
 c. v. 5. Lord Derby's Homer's Iliad, b. xiii. 6. Raverty's 
 Afghan Poetry. 7. Merchant of Venice. 8. The Tempest 
 9. Psalm i. 3. 
 
 * The Persian Gulf. 
 
TREES. 23I 
 
 1. I have seen the wicked in great power, and spreading 
 
 himself like a green bay tree. 
 
 2. The righteous shall flourish like the palm tree : he 
 
 shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon. 
 
 3. (The wicked man.) He shall shake off his unripe 
 
 grape as the vine, and shall cast off his flower as the 
 olive. 
 
 4. As when a man 
 
 Hath reared a fair and vigorous olive plant, 
 
 In some lone spot, by copious-gushing springs, 60 
 And seen expanding, nursed by every breeze, 
 Its whitening blossoms ; till with sudden gust 
 A sweeping hurricane of wind and rain 
 Uproots it from its bed, and prostrate lays ; 
 So lay the youthful son of Panthous, slain 65 
 
 By Atreus' son, 
 
 5. Who loves of life the golden mean 
 Escapes 
 
 * # # * 
 
 The giant pine-trees most invite 
 The stormy winds ; with heaviest crash 
 Fall proudest towers ; the mountain height 
 The first attracts the lightning's flash. 
 
 6. It is not growing like a tree 
 
 In bulk, doth make men better be ; 
 Or standing long an oak, three hundred year, 
 To fall a log at last, dry, bald, and sere. 
 
 A lily of a day 
 
 Is fairer far in May, 
 Although it fall and die that night — 
 It was the plant and flower of Light. 
 
 In small proportions we just beauties see ; 
 
 And in short measures life may perfect be. 
 
 7. That now he was 
 
 The ivy, which had hid my princely trunk, 
 And suck'd my verdure out on't. 
 
 8. [A Gardener. His servant observes on the state of 
 
 England.] 
 
 — our sea-walled garden, the whole land, 
 
 Is full of weeds ; her fairest flowers chok'd up, 
 
 1. Psalm xxxvii. 35. 2. Ps. xcii. 12. 3. Job xv. 33. 
 
 4. Lord Derby's Homer's Iliad, b. xvii. 5. Ibid., 
 Translations (Horace, Od. ii. 10.) 6. Ben Jonson, True 
 Growth. 7. The Tempest. 8. King Richard II., Act iii. sc. 4. 
 
232 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Her fruit-trees all unprun'd, her hedges ruin'd, 
 Her knots disorder'd and her wholesome herbs 
 Swarming with caterpillars. 
 
 [The Gardener replies.] 
 
 He that hath suffer'd this disorder'd spring, 
 
 Hath now himself met with the fall of leaf: 
 
 The weeds, which his broad-spreading leaves did 
 
 shelter, 
 That seem'd, in eating him, to hold him up, 
 Are pluck'd up, root and all, by Bolingbroke ; 
 I mean, the Earl of Wiltshire, Bushy, Green. 
 
 [He proceeds.] 
 
 We at this time of year 
 
 Do wound the bark, the skin of our fruit-trees ; 
 
 Lest, being over-proud with sap and blood, 
 
 With too much riches it confound itself : 
 
 Had he [the King] done so to great and growing 
 
 men, 
 They might have liv'd to bear, and he to taste 
 Their fruits of duty. All superfluous branches 
 We lop away, that bearing boughs may live. 
 
 Rosk. — 
 
 g. What's in a name ? That which we call a rose, 
 By any other name would smell as sweet. 
 
 Violet. — 
 
 1. She dwelt among the untrodden ways 
 
 Beside the springs of Dove ; 
 
 ;!< * ■* 
 
 A violet by a mossy stone 
 
 Half-hidden fr©m the eye ! 
 — Fair as a star, when only one 
 
 Is shining in the sky. 
 
 Plants. — 
 
 2. The rush may rise where waters flow, 
 
 And flags beside the stream ; 
 But soon their verdure fades and dies 
 Before the scorching beam. 
 
 So is the sinner's hope cut off ; 
 
 Or, if it transient rise, 
 'Tis like the spider's airy web, 
 From every breath that flies. 
 
 9. Romeo and Juliet. 1. Wordsworth, The Lost Love. 
 2. Anon. Job viii. 11 — 22. 
 
PLANTS. 233 
 
 3. [The people.) 
 
 Like to a vagabond flag upon the stream, 
 Goes to and back, lackeying the varying tide. 
 
 4. When the wicked spring as the grass, and when all 
 
 the workers of iniquity do flourish ; it is that they 
 shall be destroyed for ever. (7.) 
 
 5. {The wicked.) Let them be as the grass upon the 
 
 house-tops, which withereth afore it groweth up. 
 Wherewith the mower filleth not his hand ; nor he 
 that bindeth sheaves his bosom. 
 
 6. For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man 
 
 as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and 
 the flower thereof falleth away : 
 But the word of the Lord endureth for ever. (24, 25.) 
 
 7. As sickly plants betray a niggard earth, 
 Whose Darren bosom starves her gen'rous birth, 
 Nor genial warmth, nor genial juice retains 
 Their roots to feed, and fill their verdant veins : 
 And as in climes, where winter holds his reign, 
 The soil, though fertile, will not teem in vain, 
 Forbids her germs to swell, her shades to rise, 
 Nor trusts her blossoms to the churlish skies ; 
 
 '1- i» »i- ^ 
 
 But tyranny has fix'd her empire there, 
 
 To check their tender hopes with chilling fear, 
 
 And blast the blooming promise of the year. 
 
 8. As flowrets, by the frosty air of night 
 
 Bent clown and clos'd, when day has blanch'd their 
 
 leaves , 
 Rise all unfolded on their spiry stems ; * 
 
 9. (Enobarbus says to Antony.) 
 
 And, indeed, the tears live in an onion 
 
 that should water this sorrow. 
 
 3, 9. Antony and Cleopatra. 4. Psalm xcii. 5. Ps. 
 cxxix. 6. 1 Peter i. 7. Gray, Alliance of Education 
 and Government. 8. Cary's Dante (Hell), c. ii. 127-8. 
 
 * Cary observes : — This simile is well translated by 
 Chaucer, in Troilus and Cressida, b. ii. ; and imitated by 
 many others — as Berni, Marino, and Spenser in his Fairy 
 Queen. 
 
234 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Snow, &c. — 
 
 i. Drought and heat consume the snow waters : so 
 doth the grave those which have sinned. (19.) 
 
 2. Thus they, with cheering words, sustained the war : 
 Thick as the snow-flakes on a wintry day, 
 
 When Jove 
 
 His snow-storm sends, and manifests his power : 305 
 
 Hushed are the winds ; the flakes continuous fall, 
 
 That the high mountain-tops, and jutting crags, 
 
 And lotus-covered meads are buried deep, 
 
 And man's productive labours of the field ; 
 
 On hoary Ocean's beach and bays they lie, 310 
 
 The approaching waves their bound ; o'er all beside 
 
 Is spread by Jove the hoary veil of snow : 
 
 So thickly flew the stones from either side, 
 
 By Greeks on Trojans hurled, by these on Greeks. 
 
 3. unknit that threat'ning unkind brow ; 
 
 It blots thy beauty, as frosts bite the meads ; 
 Confounds thy fame, as whirlwinds shake fair buds ; 
 * * * 
 
 A woman mov'd, is like a fountain troubled, 
 Muddy, ill-seeming, thick, bereft of beauty. 
 
 Corn. — 
 
 4. (The wicked are) — cut off as the tops of the ears of 
 
 corn. 
 
 5. As in the corn-land of some wealthy lord 
 The rival bands of reapers mow the swathe, 
 Barley or wheat ; and fast the trusses fall ; 75 
 So Greek and Trojans mowed the opposing ranks. 
 
 Poison, &c. — 
 
 6. that which proves 
 
 Strong poison unto me, another loves, 
 
 And eats, and lives : Thus hemlock juice prevails, 
 And kills a man, but fattens goats and quails. 
 
 7. Leaves of wild olives yield a sweet repast 
 To goats, to man a rough and bitter taste. 
 
 Serpents. — 
 
 8. They have sharpened their tongues HI e a serpent; 
 
 adders' poison is under their lips. 
 
 1. Job xxiv. 2. Lord Derby's Homer's Iliad, b. xii. 
 3. Taming the Shrew. 4. Job xxiv. 5. Lord Derby's 
 Homer's Iliad, b. xi. 6. Creech's Lucretius, b. iv. 7. Ibid, 
 b. vi. 8. Psalm cxl. 3. 
 
REPTILES, ETC. 235 
 
 Reptiles. — 
 
 g. The o'erweening brood, 
 
 That plays the dragon after him that flees, 
 But unto such, as turn and show the tooth, 
 Ay or the purse, is gentle as a lamb. 
 
 Hornet. — 
 
 1. The pain of illness affects not them who are in health : 
 I will not disclose my grief but to those, 
 
 Who have tasted the same affliction. 
 It were fruitless to talk of an hornet to them, who 
 never felt its sting. 
 
 Birds. — 
 
 2. E'en as the young stork lifteth up his wing 
 Through wish to fly, yet ventures not to quit 
 The nest, and drops it ; so in me desire 
 
 Of questioning my guide arose, and fell. 
 
 3. {He is willing to imitate, not contend with Epicurus.) 
 
 For how can larks oppose 
 
 The vigorous swans ? They are unequal foes ; 
 Or how can tender kids with feeble force 
 Contend in racing with the noble horse ? 
 
 4. [Troilus says he's " mad in Cressid's love"] 
 
 her hand ! 
 
 In whose comparison all whites are ink, 
 Writing their own reproach, to whose soft seizure 
 The cygnet's down is harsh, and spirit of sense 
 Hard as the palm of ploughman ! 
 
 5. We bodg'd again ; as I have seen a swan 
 With bootless labour swim against the tide, 
 
 And spend her strength with over-matching waves. 
 
 6. True hope is swift, and flies with swallow's wings. 
 Animals. — 
 
 7. To climb steep hills, 
 Requires slow pace at first : Anger is like 
 
 A full-hot horse ; who being allow'd his way, 
 Self-mettle tires him. 
 
 8. Even the beast, in the plough, goeth uniform to the 
 
 furrow ; 
 Wherefore then, quittest thou, thus sinfully, the 
 Law's precepts ? 
 
 9. Cary's Dante {Paradise), c. xvi. 1,8. Raverty's Afghan 
 Poetry. 2. Cary's Dante (Purgatory), c. xxv. 3. Creech's 
 Lucretius, b. iii. 4. Troilus andCressida. 5. Henry VI., 
 3rd Part. 6. Richard III. 7. King Henry VIII. 
 
236 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 9. The hunting tribes of air and earth 
 Respect the brethren of their birth ; 
 Nature, who loves the claim of kind, 
 Less cruel chase to. each assign'd. 
 The falcon, poised on soaring wing, 
 Watches the wild-duck by the spring ; 
 The slow-hound wakes the fox's lair; 
 The greyhound presses on the hare ; 
 The eagle pounces on the lamb; 
 The wolf devours the fleecy dam : 
 Even tiger fell, and sullen bear, 
 Their likeness and their lineage spare ; — 
 Man, only, mars kind Nature's plan, 
 And turns the fierce pursuit on man ; 
 Plying war's desultory trade, 
 Incursion, flight, and ambuscade, 
 Since Nimrod, Cush's mighty son, 
 At first the bloody game begun. 
 
 Reflective. 
 Sun. — 
 
 1. Thro' horn the sunbeams pass, and strike our eye, 
 But water on the surface stays : 
 
 2. Though the bat hideth himself from the light of the 
 
 sun, 
 In what manner doth the sun sustain injury there- 
 from ? 
 
 3. Full many a glorious morning have I seen 
 Flatter the mountain-tops with sovereign eye, 
 Kissing with golden face the meadows green, 
 Gilding pale streams with heavenly alchemy; 
 
 4. The weary sun hath made a golden set, 
 And, by the bright track of his fiery car, 
 Gives token of a goodly day to-morrow. 
 
 5. The sun, that now blesses our arms with his light, 
 
 Saw them fall upon Ossory's plain ; 
 
 6. If the thing we seek 
 
 Be genuine knowledge, bear we then in mind 
 How, from his lofty throne, the sun can fling 
 Colours as bright on exhalations bred 
 
 By weedy pool or pestilential, 
 
 9. Scott's Rokeby, c. iii. 1. Creech's Lucretius, b. ii. 
 2. Raverty's Afghan Poetry. 3. Shakespeare's Sonnets. 
 4. King Richard III., Act v. sc. 3. 5. Moore's Irish 
 Melodies, Brien the Brave. 6. Wordsworth. 
 
MOON, STARS, ETC. 237 
 
 As by the rivulet sparkling where it runs, 
 On the pellucid lake. 
 Moon. — 
 
 7. When Phoebe doth behold 
 
 Her silver visage in the wat'ry glass, 
 Decking with liquid pearls the bladed grass. 
 
 Stars. — 
 
 8. If of the smallest star in the sky 
 We know not the dimensity ; 
 
 If those pure sparks that stars compose, 
 The highest human wit do pose ; 
 
 How then, poor shallow man, canst thou 
 The Maker of these glories know ? 
 Space. — 
 
 9. this mighty space 
 
 Is infinite, and knows no lowest place, 
 Nor uppermost; no bounds this All control, 
 For that's against the nature of the whole. 
 
 Lightning. — 
 
 1. How lightning-wing'd do pleasures fly. 
 
 2. Oh, it is excellent 
 
 To have a giant's strength ; but it is tyrannous, 
 
 To use it like a giant. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Merciful heaven ! 
 
 Thou rather, with thy sharp, and sulphurous bolt 
 Split'st the unwedgable and gnarled oak, 
 Than the soft myrtle : 
 
 3. Thoughts, from the tongue that slowly part, 
 Glance quick as lightning through the heart. 
 
 Cloud. — 
 
 4. Macb. Can such things be, 
 
 And overcome us like a summer's cloud, 
 
 Without our special wonder? 
 
 Light. — 
 
 5. Thoughts come, as pure as light. 
 Heat. — 
 
 6. Thus heat and cold, and other qualities 
 Affect the touch, whilst colours strike the eyes, 
 
 7. Midsummer Night's Dream. 8. J. Howell, Shallowness 
 of Human Knowledge. 9. Creech's Lucretius, b. ii. 1. Bow- 
 ring's Poetry of Spain, Anon. 1595. 2. Measure for 
 Measure. 3. Scott's Rokeby c. i. 4. Macbeth. 5. Moore's 
 Irish Melodies, Take back the virgin page. 6. Creech's 
 Lucretius, b. iv. 
 
2 3 8 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Odours the smell, vapours the taste, but none 
 Invades another's right, usurps his throne, 
 All live at peace, contented with their own. 
 Wind. — 
 
 7. Should a wise man utter vain knowledge, and fill 
 
 his belly with the east wind ? 
 
 8. The Arabian wind, whose breathing gently blows 
 Purple to the violet, blushes to the rose, 
 
 Did never yield an odour such as this : 
 Why are you then so thrifty of a kisse, 
 Authorized even by custom ? 
 
 Morning. — 
 
 9. Rich. See, how the morning opes her golden gates, 
 And takes her farewell of the glorious sun ! 
 
 How well resembles it the prime of youth, 
 Trimm'd like a yonker, prancing to his love ! 
 
 K. Henry. This battle fares like to the morning's war, 
 When dying clouds contend with glowing light ; 
 What time the shepherd, blowing of his nails, 
 Can neither call it perfect day, nor night. 
 
 Night. — 
 
 1. (In bed.) * * * * 
 And keep my drooping eye-lids open wide, 
 Looking on darkness which the blind do see. 
 
 2. (Macbeth says.) Come, seeling night, 
 
 Skarf up the tender eye of pitiful day ; 
 And, with thy bloody. and invisible hand, 
 Cancel, and tear to pieces, that great bond 
 
 Which keeps me pale ! Light thickens ; and the crow 
 Makes wing to the rooky wood : 
 Good things of day begin to droop and drowze ; 
 While night's black agents to their preys do rouze. 
 
 3. The silent hours steal on, 
 And flaky darkness breaks within the east. 
 
 4. The gaudy, blabbing, and remorseful day 
 Is crept into the bosom of the sea. 
 
 5. At the mid hour of night, when stars are weeping, 
 
 I fly, 
 
 To the lone vale we loved, 
 
 7. Job xv. 2. 8. W. Habington, To Castara. 9. King 
 Henry VI., 3rd Part. 1. Shakspeare's Sonnets. 2. Macbeth. 
 3. King Richard III. 4. King Henry VI., 2nd Part. 
 5. T. Moore's Poems. 
 
STREAMS, ETC. 239 
 
 6. How dear to me the hour when daylight dies, 
 
 And sunbeams melt along the silent sea. 
 
 Streams. — 
 
 7. 'Tis sweet to visit first 
 
 Untoucht and virgin streams, and quench my thirst : 
 I joy to crop fresh flowers, and get a crown 
 For new and rare inventions of my own ; 
 
 8. Smooth runs the water, where the brook is deep. 
 
 9. Comes next from Ross-shire and from Sutherland 
 
 The horny-knuckled kilted Highlandman : 
 From where, upon the rocky Caithness strand 
 Breaks the long wave that at the Pole began. 
 
 Water. — 
 
 1. Thus little puddles that in streets do lie, 
 
 Tho' scarce inch deep, admit the searching eye, 
 To view as large a space, as earth from sky. 
 
 Flint. — 
 
 2. Hearts are not flint, and flints are rent, 
 Hearts are not steel, and steel is bent. 
 
 Scenery. — 
 
 3. The hinds how bless'd who ne'er beguil'd 
 To quit their hamlet's hawthorn-wild ; 
 
 * * * * 
 
 'Midst gloomy glades, in warbles clear, 
 While Nature's sweetest notes they hear ; 
 On green untrodden banks they view 
 The hyacinth's neglected hue ; 
 In their lone haunts, and woodland rounds, 
 They spy the squirrel's airy bounds : 
 And startle from her ashen spray, 
 Across the glen, the screaming jay : 
 Each native charm their steps explore 
 Of Solitude's sequester'd store. 
 
 4. Why do those cliffs or shadowy tint appear 
 
 More sweet than all the landscape smiling near ? — 
 'Tis distance lends enchantment to the view, 
 And robes the mountain in its azure hue. 
 
 6. T. Moore, How dear to me the hour. 7. 1. Creech's 
 Lucretius, b. iv. 8. King Henry VI., 2nd Part. 
 9. W. Tennant's Anster Fair. 2. Scott's Rokeby, c. i. 
 3. T. Warton, The Hamlet. 4. T. Campbell's Pleasures of 
 Hope. 
 
240 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 5. Deem'st thou these sadden'd scenes have pleasure still, 
 Lov'st thou through Autumn's fading realms to stray, 
 To see the heath-flower wither'd on the hill, 
 
 To listen to the wood's expiring lay, 
 To note the red leaf shivering on the spray, 
 To mark the last bright tints the mountain stain, 
 On the waste fields to trace the gleaner's way, 
 And moralize on mortal joy and pain ? — 
 O ! if such scenes thou lovest, scorn not the minstrel 
 strain. 
 
 No ! do not scorn, although its hoarser note 
 Scarce with the cushat's homely song can vie, 
 Though faint its beauties as the tints remote 
 That gleam through mist in autumn's evening sky, 
 And few as leaves that tremble, sear and dry, 
 When wild November hath his bugle wound ; 
 Nor mock my toil — a lonely gleaner I, 
 Through fields time-wasted, on sad inquest bound, 
 Where happier bards of yore have richer harvest found. 
 Seasons. — 
 
 6. 1. Mark the soft-falling snow, 
 
 And the diffusive rain ; 
 
 To heaven, from whence it fell, 
 
 It turns not back again ; 
 
 But waters earth 
 
 Through every pore, 
 
 And calls forth all 
 
 Its secret store. 
 
 2. Array'd in beauteous green, 
 The hills and valleys shine, 
 And man and beast is fed 
 By Providence divine ; 
 
 The harvest bows 
 
 Its golden ears, 
 
 The copious seed 
 
 Of future years. 
 
 7. Sorrow breaks seasons, and reposing hours, 
 Makes the night morning, and the noon-tide night. 
 
 Flowers — 
 
 [Enter Arviragus, bearing Imogen as dead.] 
 
 8. With fairest flowers, 
 
 Whilst summer lasts, and I live here, Fidele, 
 I'll sweeten thy sad grave : Thou shalt not lack 
 
 5. Lord of the Isles, c. i. 6. Doddridge, Effects of the 
 Gospel. 7. King Richard III. 8. Cymbeline. 
 
241 
 
 The flower, that's like thy face, pale primrose ; nor 
 'The azur'd hare-bell, like thy veins ; no, nor 
 The leaf of eglantine, whom not to slander, 
 Out-sweeten'd not thy breath ; the ruddock [red-breast] 
 
 would, 
 
 * * bring thee all this ; 
 
 Yea, and furr'd moss besides, when flowers are none 
 To winter-ground thy corse. 
 
 9. ; and good men's lives 
 
 Expire before the flowers in their caps, 
 Dying or ere they sicken. Act iv. sc. 3. 
 
 i'i s*< >!' 5j< 
 
 I have liv'd long enough : my May of life 
 
 Is fall'n into the sear, the yellow leaf. Act v. sc. 3. 
 
 1. Not a tree, 
 
 A plant, a leaf, a blossom, but contains 
 A folio volume. We may read, and read, 
 And read again, and still find something new. 
 
 2. The morning flowers display their sweets, 
 
 And gay their silken leaves unfold, 
 As careless of the noon-tide heats, 
 As fearless of the evening cold. 
 
 Nipt by the wind's unkindly blast, 
 Parch'd by the sun's directer ray, 
 The momentary glories waste, 
 The short-lived beauties die away. 
 
 So blooms the human face divine, 
 When youth its pride of beauty shows : 
 Fairer than Spring the colours shine, 
 And sweeter than the virgin-rose. 
 Frost. — 
 
 3. chaste as the icicle, 
 
 That's curdled by the frost from purest snow, 
 And hangs on Dian's temple : 
 
 4. The snow fell on the mountains ; and covered the 
 blue-bells and the hyacinths, * * 
 
 On the tops of mountains the snow does not get 
 lower ; where the rose-trees grow, the thorns do 
 not get scarcer ; though clinging every night to my 
 bosom, my sweetheart does not get less loving. 
 
 9. Macbeth. 1. Hurdis. 2. S. Wesley, The young cut 
 off in their prime. 3. Coriolanus. 4. Alex. Chodzko's 
 Poetry of Persia. 
 
 R 
 
242 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Lambs. — ■ 
 
 5. Say ye that know, ye who have felt and seen, 
 Spring's morning smiles, and soul-enlivening green, 
 Say, did you give the thrilling transport way ? 
 
 Did your eye brighten, when young lambs at play 
 
 Leap'd o'er your path with animated pride, 
 
 Or grazed in merry clusters by your side ? 
 
 Ye who can smile, to wisdom no disgrace, 
 
 At the arch meaning of a kitten's face ; 
 
 If spotless innocence, and infant mirth, 
 
 Excite to praise, or give reflection birth, 
 
 In shades like these pursue your favourite joy, 
 
 'Mid Nature's revels, sports that never cloy. 
 
 Insects. — 
 
 6. (Augur.) Four small but very active things.) 
 Four things are little on earth, 
 
 But wiser than the wisest. 
 
 The ant race are a people without strength. 
 Yet they prepare their meat in summer. 
 The conies are a feeble race, 
 Yet build their houses in the rocks. 
 The locusts have no kings to rule them, 
 Yet all of them go forth by bands. 
 The lizard ; one may seize it with his hand, 
 And yet it dwells in royal palaces. 
 
 7. The bee is little among such as fly ; but her fruit is 
 
 the chief of sweet things. 
 
 8. From the green myriads in the peopled grass ; 
 What modes of sight betwixt each wide extreme, 
 The mole's dim curtain, and the lynx's beam ; 
 Of smell, the headlong lioness between, 
 
 And hound sagacious, in the tainted green ; 
 Of hearing, from the life that fills the flood, 
 To that which warbles through the vernal wood ! 
 The spider's touch, how exquisitely fine ! 
 Feels at each thread, and lives along the line : 
 In the nice bee, what sense so subtly true 
 From poisonous herbs extracts the healing dew ? 
 
 5. Bloomfield, Lrtw&s, 6. Herder's Spirit of Hebrew Poetry, 
 z ^33- (Proverbs xxx.) 7. Ecclesiasticus xi. 3. 8. Pope's 
 Essay on Man. 
 
CREATION. 243 
 
 Meditative. 
 Creation. — 
 
 1. 1. Now let a spacious world arise, 
 Said the Creator-Lord ; 
 At once the obedient earth and skies 
 Rose at his sovereign word. 
 
 2. Dark was the deep ; the waters lay 
 
 Confused, and drown'd the land, 
 He call'd the light ; the new-born day 
 Attends on his command. 
 
 3. He bade the clouds ascend on high ; 
 
 The clouds ascend, and bear 
 A watery treasure to the sky, 
 And float on softer air. 
 
 4. The liquid element below 
 
 Was gather'd by his hand ; 
 The rolling seas together flow, 
 And leave the solid land. 
 
 5. With herbs and plants, a flowery birth, 
 
 The naked globe He crown'd, 
 Ere there was rain to bless the earth, 
 Or sun to warm the ground.* 
 
 2. Where sleepes the northe wind when the south inspires 
 Life in the Spring, and gathers into quires 
 The scattered nightingales ? Whose subtle ears 
 Hearde first the harmonious language of the spheres ? 
 Whence hath the stone magnetic force t'allure 
 The enamoured iron ? From a seede impure, 
 Or natural, did first the mandrake grow ? 
 What power in the ocean makes it flow ? 
 What strange material is the azure sky 
 Compacted of ? of what is brightest eye, 
 The ever-flaming sunne ? What people are 
 In th' unknown world ? what worlds in every star ? — 
 Let curious fancies at these secrets rove : 
 Castara, what we know we'll practise, — Love. 
 Nature. — 
 
 3. each moss, 
 
 Each shell, each crawling insect, holds a rank 
 Important in the plan of Him who fram'd 
 This scale of beings ; holds a rank, which lost, 
 
 1. Watts, The Creation, Gen. i. 2. W. Habington, To 
 Castara. 3. B. Stillingfleet, Economy of Human Nature. 
 
 * Then follow, the skies, sun, moon, and stars ; fowl 
 and fish ; lion, grazing beasts, &c. ; and finally Adam. 
 
 R 2 
 
244 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Would break the chain, and leave behind a gap 
 Which Nature's self would rue. 
 
 4. To think, that He, who rolls yon solar sphere, 
 Uplifts the warbling songster to the sky ; 
 
 To mark His presence in the mighty bow 
 That spans the clouds, as in the tints minute 
 Of tiniest flower ; to hear His awful voice 
 In thunder speak, and whisper in the gale : 
 To know and feel His care for all that lives ; — 
 'Tis this that makes the barren waste appear 
 A fruitful field, each grove a paradise. 
 
 5. Like Nature's law, no eloquence persuades, 
 The mute harangue our ev'ry sense invades ; 
 Th' apparent precepts of th' Eternal Will, 
 His ev'ry work, and ev'ry object fill. 
 
 6. Nature I'll court in her sequester'd haunts, 
 
 By mountain, meadow, streamlet, grove, or cell, 
 Where the poised lark his evening ditty chaunts, 
 And Health, and Peace, and Contemplation dwell. 
 
 7. Ah happy hills ! ah pleasing shade ! 
 
 Ah, fields beloved in vain, 
 Where once my careless childhood stray'd, 
 
 A stranger yet to pain ! 
 I feel the gales that from ye blow, 
 A momentary bliss bestow, 
 
 As waving fresh their gladsome wing, 
 My weary soul they seem to soothe, 
 And, redolent of joy and youth, 
 To breathe a second spring. 
 
 8. By ceaseless action all that is subsists. 
 Constant rotation of th' unwearied wheel, 
 That Nature rides upon, maintains her health, 
 Her beauty, her fertility. She dreads 
 
 An instant pause, and lives but while she moves. 
 Its own revolvency upholds the World: 
 
 9. Away, away, from men and towns, 
 To the wild woods and the downs — 
 To the silent wilderness 
 
 Where the soul need not repress 
 
 4. Grahame, Study of Nature. 5. H. Brooke's Universal 
 Beauty, 1735. 6. T. Smollett's Ode to Independence. 
 7. T. Gray's Distant Prospect of Eton College. 8. Cowper, 
 The Task, b. i. 9. Shelley, The Invitation. 
 
NATURE. 245 
 
 Its music, lest it should not find 
 An echo in another's mind, 
 While the touch of Nature's art 
 Harmonizes heart to heart. 
 
 1. To Nature thus, with arms of love, 
 Entranced I clung, till, fondly pressed, 
 The Goddess seemed to breathe, to move, 
 To warm beneath my poet-breast. 
 
 With kindling fire she seemed to burn, 25 
 
 To speak in accents soft and sweet ; 
 
 My glowing kisses to return, 
 
 Throb heart to heart, and beat to beat. 
 
 Then grove and field with life were fraught ; 
 With life the flashing waters sang ; 30 
 
 Ev'n soulless things my feeling caught, 
 And forth a new creation sprang. 
 
 How swelled my bosom's narrow space ! 
 A boundless world of thought was there ! 35 
 I panted to begin my race, 
 To see, to feel, to die, to dare ! 
 
 How glorious seemed this world of ours, 
 While but the opening buds were seen ! 
 How few are now the expanded flowers, 
 And ev'n those few, how poor and mean ! 40 
 
 2. For oh, is it you, is it you, 
 Moonlight, and shadow, and lake, 
 And mountains, that fill us with joy, 
 Or the Poet who sings you so well ? 
 Is it you, O Beauty, O Grace, 
 
 O Charm, O Romance, that we feel, 
 Or the voice which reveals what you are ? 
 Are ye, like daylight and sun, 
 Shared and rejoiced in by all ? 
 Or are ye immersed in the mass 
 Of matter, and hard to extract, 
 Or sunk at the core of the world 
 Too deep for the most to discover ? 
 Like stars in the deep of the sky, 
 Which arise on the glass of the sage, 
 But are lost when their watcher is gone. 
 
 1. Lord Derby's Translations, Schiller, The Ideal. 
 2. M. Arnold's Poems, The Youth of Nature. 
 
246 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 ' Race after race, man after man, 
 Have dream'd that my secret was theirs, 
 Have thought that I lived but for them, 
 That they were my glory and joy. — 
 They are dust, they are chang'd, they are gone. — 
 I remain.' 
 Scenery. — 
 
 [ Scott impressed with the scenes of his childhood calling to 
 
 mind.'] 
 
 3. — feelings roused in life's first day. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Then rise those crags, that mountain tower 
 Which charm'd my fancy's wakening hour. 
 Though no broad river swept along, 
 To claim, perchance, heroic song ; 
 Though sigh'd no groves in summer gale, 
 To prompt of love a softer tale ; 
 Though scarce a puny streamlet's speed 
 Claim'd homage from a shepherd's reed ; 
 Yet was poetic impulse given, 
 By the green hill and clear blue heaven. 
 It was a barren scene, and wild, 
 Where naked cliffs were rudely piled ; 
 But ever and anon between 
 Lay velvet tufts of loveliest green : 
 And well the lonely infant knew 
 Recesses where the wall-flower grew 
 And honeysuckle love to crawl 
 Up the low crag and ruined wall. 
 I deem'd such nooks the sweetest shade 
 The sun in all its rounds survey'd ; 
 And still I thought that shatter'd tower 
 The mightiest work of human power; 
 Italy. — 
 
 4. How has kind Heaven adorn'd the happy land, 
 And scatterd blessings with a wasteful hand ! 
 But what avail her unexhausted stores, 
 
 Her blooming mountains, and her sunny shores, 
 
 With all the gifts that Heaven and earth impart, 
 
 The smiles of nature, and the charms of art, 
 
 While proud oppression in her valleys reigns, 
 
 And tyranny usurps her happy plains ? 
 
 The poor inhabitant beholds in vain 
 
 The reddening orange and the swelling grain : 
 
 3. Scott's Marmion, Introduction, c. iii. 4. J. Addison, 
 Letter from Italy. 
 
MORN, ETC. 247 
 
 Joyless he sees the growing oils and wines, 
 And in the myrtle's fragrant shade repines, 
 Starves, in the midst of nature's bounty curst, 
 And in the loaden vineyard dies for thirst. 
 Morn. — 
 
 5. But, look, the morn, in russet mantle clad, 
 Walks o'er the dew of yon high eastern hill. 
 
 6. The stars shall drop, the sun shall lose his flame : 
 But Thou, O God ! for ever shine the same. 
 
 World. — 
 
 7. How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable 
 Seem to me all the uses of this world ! 
 Fie on't ! O, fie ! 'tis an unweeded garden, 
 
 That grows to seed ; things rank, and gross in nature, 
 
 Possess it merely. Act i. sc. 2. 
 
 Seasons. — 
 
 8. From you have I been absent in the spring, 
 When proud-pied April, dressed in all his trim, 
 Hath put a spirit of youth in everything ; 
 
 That heavy Saturn laughed and leaped with him. 
 Yet nor the lays of birds, nor the sweet smell 
 Of different flowers in odour and in hue, 
 Could make me any summer's story tell, 
 Or from their proud lap pluck them where they grew. 
 Nor did I wonder at the lilies white, 
 Nor praise the deep vermilion of the rose : 
 They were but sweet, but figures of delight, 
 Drawn after you ; you, pattern of all those, 
 Yet seemed it winter still, and you away, 
 As with your shadow I with these did play. 
 
 9. Sweet Spring, thou turn'st with all thy goodly train, 
 Thy head with flames, thy mantle bright with flow'rs, 
 The zephyrs curl the green locks of the plain, 
 
 The clouds for joy in pearls weep down their show'rs. 
 Thou turn'st, sweet Spring ; — but ah ! my pleasant 
 
 hours, 
 And happy days with thee come not again. 
 1. Why dost thou looke so pale, decrepit man ? 
 Why doe thy cheekes curie, like the ocean, 
 Into such furrows ? Why dost thou appeare 
 So shaking like an ague to the yeare ? 
 The sunne is gone. 
 
 5, 7. Hamlet. 6. Gay's Contemplation on Night. 
 
 8. Shakspeare's Sonnets. 9. W. Drummond {Haw- 
 thovnden) Sonnets. 1. W. Habington, To Winter. 
 
248 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 2. Now the golden morn aloft 
 
 Waves her dew-bespangled wing. 
 With vermil cheek, and whisper soft, 
 
 She woos the tardy spring : 
 Till April starts, and calls around 
 The sleeping fragrance from the ground, 
 And lightly o'er the living scene 
 Scatters his freshest, tenderest green. 
 
 New-born flocks, in rustic dance, 
 
 Frisking ply their feeble feet ; 
 Forgetful of their wintry trance, 
 
 The birds his presence greet : 
 But, chief the skylark warbles high 
 His trembling, thrilling ecstacy, 
 And, lessening from the dazzled sight, 
 Melts into air and liquid light. 
 
 Yesterday the sullen year 
 
 Saw the snowy whirlwind fly ; 
 Mute was the music of the air, 
 
 The herd stood drooping by : 
 Their raptures now that wildly flow, 
 No yesterday, nor morrow know ; 
 'Tis man alone that joy descries 
 With forward and reverted eyes. 
 
 Smiles on past misfortune's brow 
 
 Soft Reflection's hand can trace, 
 And o'er the cheek of sorrow throw 
 
 A melancholy grace ; 
 While Hope prolongs our happier hour, 
 Or deepest shades, that dimly lower 
 And blacken round our weary way, 
 Gilds with a gleam of distant day. 
 
 Time.— 
 
 3. Time of itself is nothing; but from thought 
 Receives its rise, by labouring fancy wrought 
 From things consider'd, whilst we think on some 
 As present, some as past, or yet to come, 
 
 No thought can think on Time, that's still eonfest, 
 But thinks on things in motion, or at rest. 
 
 4. When I do count the clock that tells the time, 
 And see the brave day sunk in hideous night ; 
 When I behold the violet past prime, 
 
 And sable curls all silvered o'er with white, 
 
 2. T. Gray, On Vicissitude. 3. Creech's Lucretius, b. 
 4. Shakspeare's Sonnets. 
 
DECAY. 249 
 
 When lofty trees I see barren of leaves, 
 Which erst from heat did canopy the herd, 
 And summer's green all girded up in sheaves, 
 Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard ; 
 Then of thy beauty do I question make, 
 That thou among the wastes of time must go, 
 Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake, 
 And die as fast as they see others grow ; 
 
 And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make 
 defence, 
 
 Save Love, to brave him, when he takes thee hence. 
 Decay. — 
 
 5. To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, 
 Creeps in this petty pace from day to day, 
 To the last syllable of recorded time ; 
 
 And all our yesterdays have lighted fools 
 
 The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle ! 
 
 Life's but a walking shadow ; a poor player, 
 
 That struts and frets his hour upon the stage, 
 
 And then is heard no more : it is a tale 
 
 Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, 
 
 Signifying nothing. 
 
 6. What does not fade ? the tower that long had stood 
 The crush of thunder and the warring winds, 
 Shook by the slow, but sure destroyer, Time, 
 Now hangs in doubtful ruins o'er its base. 
 
 And flinty pyramids, and walls of brass, 
 Descend : the Babylonian spires are sunk ; 
 Achaia, Rome, and Egypt moulder down. 
 Time shakes the stable tyranny of thrones, 
 The tottering empires crush by their own weight. 
 This huge rotundity where tread grows old ; 
 And all those worlds that roll around the sun, 
 The sun himself, shall die. 
 
 7. This common field, this little brook, 
 
 What is there hidden in these two, 
 That I so often on them look — 
 
 Oftener than on the heavens blue ? 
 No beauty lies upon the field ; 
 Small music doth the river yield ; 
 And yet I look, and look again, 
 With something of a pleasant pain. 
 
 5. Macbeth. 6. Armstrong's Art of Preserving Health. 
 7. Barry Cornwall, The Poet. 
 
250 NATURE-STUDY". 
 
 'Tis thirty — can it be thirty years 
 
 Since last I stood upon this plank, 
 Which o'er the brook its figure rears, 
 
 And watched the pebbles as they sank ? 
 How white the stream ! I still remember 
 Its margin glassed by hoar December, 
 And how the sun fell on the snow : 
 Ah ! can it be so long ago ? 
 
 8. Unwatch'd, the garden bough shall sway, 
 
 The tender blossom flutter down, 
 Unloved that beech will gather brown, 
 This maple burn itself way ; 
 
 Unloved, the sun-flower, shining fair, 
 Ray round with flames her disk of seed, 
 And many a rose-carnation feed 
 
 With summer spice the humming air; 
 
 Unloved, by many a sandy bar, 
 The brook shall babble down the plain, 
 At noon or when the lesser wain 
 
 Is twisting round the polar star ; 
 
 Uncared for, gird the windy grove, 
 
 And flood the haunts of hern and crake ; 
 Or into silver arrows break 
 
 The sailing moon in creek and cove ; 
 
 Till from the garden and the wild 
 A fresh association blow, 
 And year by year the landscape grow 
 
 Familiar to the stranger's child ; 
 
 As year by year the labourer tills 
 
 His wonted glebe, or lops the glades ; 
 And year by year our memory fades 
 
 From all the circle of the hills. 
 
 9. With blackest moss the flower-plots 
 
 Were thickly crusted, one and all : 
 The rusted nails fell from the knots 
 That held the pear to the garden-wall. 
 
 Weeded and worn the ancient thatch 
 Upon the lonely moated grange. 
 
 8. Tennyson's In Memoriam, 100. 9. Tennyson 
 Poems (1865), Mariana. 
 
DECAY. 25I 
 
 11. 
 
 Her tears fell with the dews at even ; 
 
 Her tears fell ere the dews were dried ; 
 She could not look on the sweet heaven, 
 
 Either at morn or eventide. 
 After the flitting of the bats, 
 
 When thickest dark did trance the sky, 
 
 She * * * 
 
 glanced athwart the gloomy flats. 
 
 * * * 
 
 in. 
 Upon the middle of the night, 
 
 Waking she heard the night-fowl crow: 
 The cock sung out an hour ere light ; 
 From the dark fen the oxen's low 
 Came to her: 
 
 Till cold winds woke the gray-eyed morn 
 About the lonely moated grange. 
 
 IV. 
 
 About a stone-cast from the wall 
 
 A sluice with blackened waters slept, 
 And o'er it many, round and small, 
 
 The cluster'd marish-mosses crept. 
 Hard by a poplar shook alway, 
 
 All silver-green with gnarled bark: 
 
 For leagues no other tree did mark 
 
 The level waste, the rounding gray. 
 * # * 
 
 v. 
 
 And ever when the moon was low, 
 
 And the shrill winds were up and away, 
 In the white curtain, to and fro, 
 
 She saw the gusty shadow sway. 
 But when the moon was very low, 
 
 And wild winds bound within their cell, 
 
 The shadow of the poplar fell 
 Upon her bed, across her brow. 
 
 VI. 
 
 All day within the dreamy house, 
 
 The doors upon their hinges creak'd ; 
 
 The blue fly sung in the pane ; the mouse 
 Behind the mouldering wainscot shriek'd, 
 
 Or from the crevice peer'd about. 
 
252 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 VII. 
 
 The sparrow's chirrup in the roof, 
 
 The slow clock ticking, and the sound 
 
 Which to the wooing wind aloof 
 The poplar made, did all confound 
 
 Her sense ; but most she loathed the hour 
 When the thick-moted sunbeam lay 
 Athwart the chambers, and the day 
 
 Was sloping toward his western bower. 
 Then, said she, ' I am very dreary, 
 
 He will not come,' she said ; 
 She wept, ' I am aweary, aweary, 
 Oh God, that I were dead !' 
 
 Death. — 
 
 1. The breath of Time shall blast the flow'ry spring, 
 Which so perfumes thy cheeke, and with it bring 
 So dark a mist, as shall eclipse the light 
 
 Of thy faire eyes in an eternal night. 
 
 Subtilty. — 
 
 2. Those odours too, whose smells delight 
 
 And please the nose, are all too thin for sight. 
 
 We view not heat, nor sharpest colds, which wound 
 
 The tender nerves, nor can we see a sound. 
 
 3. Thus odours rise from gums, a gentle breeze 
 From rivers flow, and from the neighbouring seas 
 Sharp salts arise, and fret the shores around ; 
 Thus all the air is filled with murmuring sound ; 
 And whilst we walk the strand, and pleas'd to view 
 The wanton waves, or squeeze and mingle rue, 
 
 Or salt or bitter tastes our tongues surprise ; 
 So certain 'tis, that subtle parts arise 
 From all, and wander in the lower skies ; 
 These never cease to flow, because the ear, 
 And eye, and nose, still smell, or see, or hear. 
 
 Shapes. — 
 
 4. Besides, consider men, or beasts, or trees, 
 Or silent fish that cut the yielding seas, 
 
 Or birds, or those that wanton o'er the floods, 
 Or fill with tuneful sounds the list'ning woods ; 
 Consider each particular, you'll find, 
 How different shapes appear in every kind. 
 
 1. W. Habington, To Castara ; On Age and Death. 
 2. Creech's Lucretius, b. i. 3. Ibid., b. iv. 4. Ibid., b. ii. 
 
WATER. 253 
 
 5. Besides, what various shapes in corn appear? 
 A different size to every grain and ear ; 
 
 And so in shells, where waters washing o'er 
 With wanton kisses bathe the amorous shore. 
 And therefore seeds, 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Must not be all alike, their shapes the same. 
 
 Water. — 
 
 6. Besides, that seas, that rivers waste, and die, 
 And still increase by constant new supply, 
 
 What need of proofs ? This streams themselves do 
 
 show, 
 And in soft murmurs babble as they flow. 
 But lest the mass of water prove too great, 
 The sun drinks some, to quench his natural heat ; 
 And some the winds brush off, with wanton play 
 They dip their wings, and bear some parts away : 
 Some passes through the earth, diffused all o'er, 
 And leaves its salt behind in every pore ; 
 For all returns thro' narrow channels spread, 
 And joins where'er the fountain shows her head : 
 And thence sweet streams in fair meanders play, 
 And thro' the valleys cut their liquid way ; 
 And herbs, and flowers on every side bestow, 
 The fields all smile with flowers where'er they flow. 
 
 7. This glassy stream, that spreading pine, 
 
 Those alders quiv'ring to the breeze, 
 
 Might soothe a soul less hurt than mine, 
 
 And please, if anything could please. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Me frightful scenes and prospects waste, 
 
 Alike admonish not to roam ; 
 These tell me of enjoyments past, 
 
 And those of sorrows yet to come. 
 
 8. Thy braes were bonny, Yarrow stream, 
 When first on them I met my lover ; 
 Thy braes how dreary, Yarrow stream, 
 When now thy waves his body cover ! 
 For ever now, O Yarrow stream ! 
 Thou art to me a stream of sorrow ; 
 For never on thy banks shall I 
 Behold my Love, the flower of Yarrow. 
 
 5. Creech's Lucretius, b. ii. 6. Ibid., b. v. 7. Cow- 
 per, The Shrubbery., 8. J. Logan, The Braes of Yarrow. 
 
254 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Herds, &c. — 
 
 9. Happy the man, whose wish and care 
 A few paternal acres bound, 
 Content to breathe his native air 
 
 In his own ground. 
 Whose herds with milk, whose fields with bread. 
 Whose flocks supply him with attire : 
 Whose trees in summer yield him shade, 
 In winter, fire. 
 
 Trees. — 
 
 1. Here let me, careless and unthoughtful lying, 
 
 Hear the soft winds, above me flying, 
 With all their wanton boughs dispute, 
 And the more tuneful birds to both replying ; 
 Nor be myself, too, mute. 
 
 A silver stream shall roll his waters near, 
 Gilt with the sunbeams here and there, 
 On whose enamelled banks I'll walk, 
 
 And see how prettily they smile, and hear 
 How prettily they talk. 
 
 2. The darksome pines that o'er yon rocks reclined 
 Wave high, and murmur to the hollow wind, 
 
 The wandering streams, that shine between the hills, 
 
 The grots that echo to the tinkling rills, 
 
 The dying gales that pant upon the trees, 
 
 The lakes that quiver to the curling breeze ; 
 
 No more these scenes my meditation aid, 
 
 Or lull to rest the visionary maid. 
 
 3. When Fortune smil'd, and Nature's charms were new, 
 
 I lov'd to see the oak majestic tower, — 
 I lov'd to see the apple's painted flower, 
 
 Bedropp'd with pencill'd tints of rosy hue ; 
 
 Now, more I love thee, Melancholy Yew ! 
 
 Whose still green leaves in solemn silence wave, 
 Above the peasant's rude unhonour'd grave, 
 
 Which oft thou moistenest with the morning dew. 
 
 4. Reader ! hast thou ever stood to see 
 
 The Holly-tree ? 
 The eye that contemplates it well, perceives 
 
 Its glossy leaves 
 Order'd by an intelligence, so wise 
 As might confound the Atheist's sophistries. 
 
 9. Pope, The Quiet Life. 1. Cowley, Solitude. 2. Pope, 
 Eloisa to Abelard. 3. Dr. Leyden, To the Yew Tree. 
 4. Dr. Southey, The Holly Tree. 
 
TREES, ETC. 25J 
 
 Below a circling fence its leaves are seen, 
 
 Wrinkled and keen ; 
 No grazing cattle through their prickly round 
 
 Can reach to wound ; 
 But as they grow where nothing is to fear, 
 Smooth and unarm'd the pointless leaves appear. * 
 I love to view these things with curious eyes, 
 
 And moralize : 
 
 5. Round thy young front, all dark and sear, 
 I twined e'en now the cypress wreath ; 
 And paler than the paling year 
 
 Thou bendest toward the bed of death. 
 
 Ere yonder russet grass shall fade, 
 Ere droop upon yon vine-clad height 
 The last remains of lingering shade, 
 Thy youth shall feel the nipping blight. 
 
 And I must die ! the chilling blast 
 Congeals me with its icy touch ; 
 And ere my spring of life is past, 
 I feel my winter's near approach. 
 
 Flowers. — 
 
 6. For Hamlet, and the trifling of his favour, 
 Hold it a fashion, and a toy in blood ; 
 
 A violet in the youth of primy nature, 
 Forward, not permanent, sweet, not lasting, 
 The perfume and suppliance of a minute : 
 No more. 
 
 7. Ask me why this flower does show 
 So yellow-green, and sickly too ? 
 Ask me why the stalk is weak, 
 And bending, yet it doth not break ? 
 I will answer, these discover 
 What fainting hopes are in a lover. 
 
 8. Sweet-scented flower ! who art wont to bloom 
 
 On January's front severe, 
 And o'er wintry desert drear 
 To waft thy waste perfume ! 
 
 5. Lord Derby's Translations, Millevoye, (French). 
 6. Hamlet. 7. R. Herrick, The Primrose. 8. H. K. White, 
 To the Rosemary. 
 
 * See extract from Southey's Diary. Chap. ii. p. 73. 
 No. 6. 
 
256 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Come, thou shalt form my nosegay now, 
 And I will bind thee round my brow ; 
 
 And, as I twine the mournful wreath, 
 I'll weave a melancholy song ; 
 And sweet the strain shall be, and long, 
 
 The melody of death. 
 
 9. The flower in ripen'd bloom unmatch'd 
 
 Must fall the earliest prey ; 
 Though by no hand untimely snatch'd, 
 
 The leaves must drop away. 
 And yet it were a greater grief 
 To watch it withering leaf by leaf, 
 
 Than see it pluck'd to-day: 
 Since earthly eye but ill can bear 
 To trace the change to foul form fair. 
 
 * * * 
 
 1. I remember, I remember 
 The roses, red and white, 
 
 The violets, and the lily-cups — 
 Those flowers made of light ! 
 The lilacs where the robin built, 
 And where my brother set 
 The laburnum on his birthday, — 
 The tree is living yet ! 
 
 The fir-trees dark and high ; 
 
 I used to think their slender tops 
 
 Were close against the sky : 
 
 2. I gazed — and gazed — but little thought 
 What wealth to me the show had brought, 
 For oft, when on my couch 1 lie 
 
 In vacant or in pensive mood, 
 They flash upon that inward eye, 
 Which is the bliss of solitude : 
 And then my heart with pleasure fills, 
 And dances with the daffodils. 
 
 3. There is sweet music here that softer falls 
 Than petals from blown roses on the grass, 
 Or night-dews on still waters between walls 
 Of shadowy granite, in a glimmering pass ; 
 
 9. Byron, Elegy on Thyrza. 1. T. Hood, Past and Present. 
 2. Wordsworth, Daffodils. 3. Tennyson, The Lotus-Eaters. 
 (Choric Song.) 
 
POETICAL TENDENCY. 257 
 
 Music that gentlier on the spirit lies, 
 Than tir'd eyelids on tir'd eyes : 
 
 * * # 
 
 All its allotted length of days, 
 
 The flower ripens in its place, 
 
 Ripens and fades, and falls, and hath no toil, 
 
 Fast rooted in the fruitful soil. 
 
 All things have rest, and ripen towards the grave 
 In silence ; ripen, fall,, and cease ; 
 
 * 4f # 
 
 To watch the crisping ripples on the beach, 
 And tender curving lines of creamy spray. 
 
 In bringing this large collection of examples to a 
 close, we may observe that the passages embody- 
 ing Association and Reflection are nearly equal 
 in number, while those devoted to Comparison 
 and Meditation are twice as many. Assuming 
 that our selection has been fairly made, this 
 shows how prone the poets are to seize on sub- 
 jects giving scope generally to the comparative 
 and meditative, in their observances of Nature. 
 The arrangement adopted is not so rigorous but 
 that some subjects might change places ; still, 
 any order that sufficiently distinguishes one class 
 of subjects from another fully attains the re- 
 quired end. 
 
 The general impression received from a peru- 
 sal of these specimens is, that where they are 
 somewhat imaginative they are not sufficiently 
 so to take a higher rank than that allotted them, 
 although in many instances they would be 
 otherwise considered in ordinary poetical selec- 
 tions. We have chosen, however, to make a 
 distinction which we hope to show, satisfactorily, 
 is neither arbitrary nor unnecessary. 
 
( *S* ) 
 
 Chapter IX. 
 
 Imagination and Fancy ; former poetical illustrations gene- 
 rally deficient in both; Dr. Brown on Imagination; 
 Professor Bain on poetical truth : Imagination and 
 Fancy defined ; Poetical conception excels production ; 
 sentiments of Humboldt, and Lord Macaulay; various 
 illustrative poetical specimens ; remarks on the same. 
 
 Many of the illustrative poetical specimens 
 we have given might not inappropriately have 
 found a place in the present chapter ; such, for 
 example, as the descriptive pieces taken from 
 Paradise Lost, and similar works of imagination, 
 which are little other than fancy's sketches. 
 Several pieces of this class will be given which 
 in like manner might rank as Descriptive, rather 
 than Imaginative pieces. But in the present 
 part of our work we necessarily feel less re- 
 stricted than in the previous classifications, which, 
 indeed, we have adopted chiefly for convenience 
 in future reference. We may now, therefore, 
 introduce a more extended variety of topics and 
 modes of treatment. 
 
 Dr. Brown, in his Philosophy of the Mind, 
 1846, treating on imagination, observes: Of 
 the various images that exist in the mind of the 
 poet, in those efforts of fancy which we term 
 creative, having already some leading conception 
 in his mind, he perceives the relation which certain 
 images of the group bear to his leading conception; 
 and these images instantly becoming more lively, 
 
NATURE : THE INSPIRER. 259 
 
 and more permanent, the others gradually dis- 
 appear, and leave those beautiful groups which 
 he seems to have brought together by an effort 
 of volition. Nature is to him, what it has been 
 in every age, the only true and everlasting muse 
 — the Inspirer — to whom we are indebted as 
 much for everything which is magnificent in 
 human art, as for those glorious models of 
 excellence, which, in the living and inanimate 
 scene of existing things, is presented to the 
 admiration of the genius which Nature inspires. 
 
 So much has been written on the subject of 
 imagination by metaphysicians that we feel 
 relieved from the necessity of any elaborate dis- 
 cussion in these pages; a discussion which, 
 indeed, would be scarcely pertinent to our pre- 
 sent purpose. 
 
 Professor Bain in concluding his treatise on 
 The Senses and the Intellect, 1864, remarks that: 
 there always will be a distinction between the 
 degree of truth attainable by an artist, and that 
 attained by a man of science. The poet cannot 
 study realities with an undivided attention. 
 His readers do not desire truth simply for its 
 own sake ; and it cannot be supposed that the 
 utmost plenitude of poetic genius will ever be 
 able to represent the world faithfully, by dis- 
 carding all devices in favour of flowery ornament 
 and melodious metre. We ought not to look 
 to an artist to guide us to truth ; it is enough for 
 him that he does not mis-guide us. 
 
 As regards the poet, he may frequently 
 infringe truth to nature without censure; but 
 he has not the same licence in reference to senti- 
 
 s 2 
 
260 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 ment, whether moral or religious ; for while his 
 deviations from exact truth in the one case may 
 even be admired, and can never misguide our 
 intelligence in respect to physical facts ; a similar 
 deviation in the other case would be fraught 
 with serious consequences to the well-being of 
 society. 
 
 Imagination appears to be analogous to Design 
 in the originating of any poetical subject, inde- 
 pendently of the colouring or treatment in 
 language ; and Fancy, as distinguished therefrom, 
 may be regarded as the colouring or language, 
 apart from the design itself : the one compassing 
 the subject as a whole, the other dealing with 
 its detaih We may, therefore, find examples 
 of Imagination, classical and severe, without any 
 considerable display of Fancy ; and examples 
 of Fancy, rich and glowing, without commen- 
 surate Imagination ; or we may meet with 
 passages in which there is a discordant mingling 
 of both. To their harmonious union we owe 
 the works of Homer and Milton, of Chaucer, 
 Spenser, and Shakspeare. Fancy has been 
 designated a lighter play of the imaginative 
 faculty. But whatever definition we may be 
 inclined to adopt, the impressions produced by 
 Imagination and Fancy on our minds will remain 
 as universal as their source. With Campbell 
 we may declare : — 
 
 Above, below, in ocean, earth, and sky, 
 Thy fairy worlds, Imagination, lie. 
 
 Next to the possession of Imagination, is the 
 Poet's power of producing, through his work, 
 on the minds of his readers, a strong and abiding 
 
CONCEPTION AND EXPRESSION. 26 1 
 
 impress of this grand mental faculty. Poets 
 often give expression to a sense of their own 
 deficiencies in this respect, and perhaps no man 
 of genius ever yet felt satisfied that he had in 
 his works done justice to his own conceptions. 
 In The Prelude, Wordsworth, having alluded to 
 the influences of breezes, brooks, waves, and 
 groves, exclaims : — 
 
 Oh ! that I had a music and a voice 
 Harmonious as your own, that I might tell 
 What ye have done for me. 
 
 Such are the difficulties experienced in embody- 
 ing poetical conceptions by sensitive, intelligent 
 minds, not averse to equally candid confessions, 
 even when poets — 
 
 as Prophets, each with each 
 
 Connected in a mighty scheme of truth, 
 Have each his own peculiar faculty, 
 Heaven's gift, a sense that fits him to perceive 
 Objects unseen before. 
 
 Wordsworth concludes The Prelude : — 
 
 Nature's secondary grace 
 
 Hath hitherto been barely touched upon, 
 
 The charm more superficial that attends 
 
 Her works, as they present to Fancy's choice 
 
 Apt illustrations of the moral world, 
 
 Caught at a glance, or traced with curious pains. 
 
 This latter topic — 
 
 Apt illustrations of the moral world, 
 
 would admit of considerable enlargement. 
 Humboldt in his Cosmos observes that: As 
 intelligence and forms of speech, thought and 
 its verbal symbols, are united by secret and 
 indissoluble links, so does the external world 
 blend, almost unconsciously to ourselves, with 
 our ideas and feelings. And Lord Macaulay in 
 his Essays has very happily remarked that : 
 
262 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Everything has passed away but the great 
 features of Nature, and the heart of man, and 
 poetry, among the miracles of art, of which it 
 is the office to reflect back the heart of man and 
 the features of Nature. 
 
 No writer would be suspected of possessing 
 imagination or fancy who should merely say : 
 c Man is but flesh and blood, and like all animal 
 nature, when overcome by age, disease, or 
 famine, then will he become a sudden prey to 
 death.' But we should judge differently of the 
 language of Job : ' Although affliction cometh 
 not forth of the dust, neither doth trouble spring 
 out of the ground ; yet man is born unto trouble, 
 as the sparks fly upward. Thou shalt come to 
 thy grave in a full age, like as a shock of corn 
 cometh in his season. ' 
 
 The passages which follow are selected as 
 
 examples of the predominance of Imagination 
 
 and Fancy over mere description in poetical 
 
 composition. 
 
 Universe. 
 Nature. — 
 
 1. come, trace 
 
 The epitaph of glory fled, 
 
 For now the Earth has changed her face, 
 
 A frown is on the Heaven's brow. 
 
 We wander'd to the Pine Forest 
 
 That skirts the ocean's foam ; 
 The lightest wind was in its nest, 
 
 The tempest in its home. 
 The whispering waves were half asleep, 
 
 The clouds were gone to play, 
 And in the bosom of the deep 
 
 The smile of Heaven lay ; 
 It seem'd as if the hour were one 
 
 Sent from beyond the skies, 
 
 1. Shelley, The Recollection. 
 
UNIVERSE. 263 
 
 Which scatter'd from above the sun 
 A light of Paradise ! 
 
 We paused amid the pines that stood 
 
 The giants of the waste, 
 Tortured by storms to shapes as rude 
 
 As serpents interlaced, — 
 And soothed by every azure breath 
 
 That under heaven is blown, 
 To harmonies and hues beneath 
 
 As tender as its own : 
 Now all the tree-tops lay asleep 
 
 Like green waves on the sea, 
 As still as in the silent deep 
 
 The ocean-woods may be. 
 
 How calm it was ! the silence there 
 
 By such a chain was bound, 
 That even the busy woodpecker 
 
 Made stiller by her sound 
 The inviolable quietness ; 
 
 # * * * 
 
 We paused beside the pools that lie 
 
 Under the forest bough ; 
 Each seem'd as 'twere a little sky 
 
 Gulf'd in a world below; 
 A firmament of purple light 
 
 Which in the dark earth lay, 
 More boundless than the depth of night 
 
 And purer than the day — 
 In which the lovely forests grew 
 
 As in the upper air, 
 More perfect both in shape and hue 
 
 Than any spreading there. 
 
 As a lizard with the shade 
 
 Of a trembling leaf, 
 Thou with sorrow art dismay'd ; 
 
 * * # " * 
 
 I love all that thou lovest, 
 
 Spirit of Delight ! 
 The fresh Earth in new leaves drest 
 
 And the starry night ; 
 Autumn evening, and the morn 
 When the golden mists are born. 
 
 I love snow and all the forms 
 Of the radiant frost ; 
 
 2. Shelley's Invocation. 
 
264 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 I love waves, and winds, and storms, 
 
 Everything almost 
 Which is Nature's, and may be 
 Untainted by man's misery. 
 
 O Nature ! holy, meek, and mild, 
 Thou dweller on the mountain wild ; 
 Thou haunter of the lonesome wood ; 
 Thou wanderer by the secret flood ; 
 Thou lover of the daisied sod, 
 Where'Spring's white foot hath lately trod ; 
 Finder of flowers, fresh-sprung and new, 
 Where sunshine comes to seek the dew ; 
 * * * * 
 
 Or lead me forth o'er dales and meads, 
 E'en as her child the mother leads ; 
 Where corn, yet milk in its green ears ; 
 The dew upon its shot blade bears ; 
 Where blooming clover grows, and where 
 She licks her scented foot, the hare ; 
 Where twin-nuts cluster thick, and springs 
 The thistle with ten thousand stings ; 
 Untrodden flowers and unprun'd trees, 
 Gladden'd with songs of birds and bees. 
 
 Say, ye gentle breezes, say, 
 Round me why so gently breathing ? 
 What impels thee, streamlet ! wreathing 
 Through the rocks thy silver way ? 
 
 Thou little woodland flower 
 Who always art conceal'd, 
 Through forest and through field 
 
 I've sought thee many an hour, 
 
 I love the birds that sing, 
 The shade the branches fling, 
 The golden-winged fly, 
 As, pleased he springs on high. 
 
 6. Where rose the mountains, there to him were friends ; 
 Where roll'd the ocean, thereon was his home ; 
 Where a blue sky and glowing clime extends ; 
 He had the passion and the power to roam ; 
 The desert, forest, cavern, breaker's foam, 
 
 3. A Cunningham, Nature. 4. Bowring's Russian Poets, 
 (Zhukovsky.) 5. Oxenford's French Songs, Emile Barateau. 
 The Woodland Flower. 6. Childe Harold, c. iii. 
 
UNIVERSE. 265 
 
 Were unto him companionship ; they spake 
 A mutual language, clearer than the tome 
 Of his land's tongue, which he would oft forsake 
 For Nature's pages glass'd by sunbeams on the lake. xiii. 
 * * * * 
 
 Above me are the Alps, 
 
 The palaces of nature, whose vast walls 
 Have pinnacled in clouds their snowy scalps, 
 And throned Eternity in icy halls 
 Of cold sublimity, where forms and falls 
 The avalanche — the thunderbolt of snow ! 
 All that expands the spirits, yet appals, 
 Gather around these summits, as to show 
 How earth may pierce to heaven, yet leave vain man 
 below. lxii. 
 
 7. Thin, thin the pleasant human voices grow, 
 
 And faint the city gleams ; 
 Rare the lone pastoral huts ; marvel not thou ! 
 The solemn peaks, but to the stars are known, 
 But to the stars, and the cold lunar beams ; 
 Alone the sun arises, and alone 
 
 Spring the great streams. 
 
 8. I. 
 Nature, so far as in her lies, 
 
 Imitates God, and turns her face 
 
 To every land beneath the skies, 
 
 Counts nothing that she meets with base, 
 But lives and loves in every place. 
 11. 
 
 Fills out the homely quickset-screens, 
 And makes the purple lilac ripe, 
 
 Steps from her airy hill, and greens 
 
 The swamp, where hums the dropping snipe, 
 With moss and braided marish-pipe. 
 in. 
 
 And on thy heart a finger lays, 
 
 Saying, ' beat quicker, for the time 
 
 Is pleasant, and the woods and ways 
 Are pleasant, and the beech and lime 
 Put forth and feel a gladder clime.' 
 Sun, &c— 
 
 9. The pair of blessed luminaries move, 
 Like the accordant twinkling of two eyes, 
 Their beamy circlets, dancing to the sounds. 
 
 7. Arnold's Eoems. 8. Tennyson, On a Mourner. 
 
 9. Cary's Dante, c. xx. 
 
266 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 i. Blest power of sunshine ! genial day, 
 
 What balm, what life is in thy way ! 
 To feel thee is such real bliss, 
 That had the world no joy but this, 
 To sit in sunshine calm and sweet, — - 
 It were a world too exquisite 
 For men to leave it for the gloom, 
 The deep, cold shadow of the tomb ! 
 
 Moon, &c. — 
 
 2. How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank ! 
 Here will we sit, and let the sounds of music 
 Creep in our ears ; soft stillness, and the night, 
 Become the touches of sweet harmony. 
 
 Look, how the floor of heaven 
 
 Is thick inlaid with patines* of bright gold ; 
 
 There's not the smallest orb, which thou behold'st, 
 
 But in his motion like an angel sings, 
 
 Still quiring to the young-ey'd cherubins. 
 
 Such harmony is in immortal souls ; 
 
 But, whilst this muddy vesture of decay 
 
 Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it. 
 
 3. Along a wide-spread pasture stray 
 A flock of sheep all silver white ; 
 And as we see them there to-day, 
 So stood they erst in Adam's sight. 
 (Their guardian) * * 
 A shepherdess with silver horn. 
 
 4. The rising moon has hid the stars ; 
 Her level rays, like golden bars, 
 
 Lie on the landscape green, 
 With shadows brown between. 
 
 And silver white the river gleams, 
 As if Diana, in her dreams, 
 
 Had dropt her silver bow 
 
 Upon the meadow low. 
 
 I. Lalla Rookh. 2. Merchant of Venice, Act v. sc. 1. 
 3. Lambert's Poems from the German. {Schiller.) 4. H.W. 
 Longfellow's Endymion. 
 
 * A flat dish for administering the Eucharist, 
 
EARTH, ETC. 267 
 
 Earth. — 
 
 5. There stands a spacious residence 
 
 On viewless columns strong, 
 None absent there, none go from thence, 
 Yet there none tarry long. 
 * * * 
 
 It has a roof of crystal sheen, 
 
 One gem of lustre rare ; 
 But never was the Builder seen 
 
 Who rear'd the fabric fair. 
 
 Stars. — 
 
 6. 1. When marshall'd on the nightly plain, 
 
 The glittering host bestud the sky ; 
 One star alone, of all the train, 
 Can fix the sinner's wandering eye. 
 
 2. Hark ! hark ! to God the chorus breaks, 
 
 From every host, from every gem ; 
 But one alone the Saviour speaks, 
 It is the star of Bethlehem. 
 
 3. Once on the raging seas I rode, 
 
 The storm was loud, — the night was dark, 
 The ocean yawn'd — and rudely blow'd 
 The wind that toss'd my foundering bark. 
 
 4. Deep horror then my vitals froze ; 
 
 Death-struck, I ceased the tide to stem ; 
 When suddenly a star arose, 
 It was the star of Bethlehem. 
 
 5. It was my guide, my light, my all, 
 
 It bade my dark foreboding cease ; 
 And through the storm and danger's thrall, 
 It led me to the port of peace. 
 
 6. Now safely moor'd — my perils o'er, 
 
 I'll sing, first in night's diadem, 
 For ever and for evermore, 
 
 The star ! — the Star of Bethlehem ! 
 
 7. Bright Star ! would I were stedfast as thou art — 
 Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night, 
 And watching, with eternal lids apart, 
 
 Like nature's patient sleepless Eremite, 
 
 5. Schiller, The Earth and Sky. 6. H. K. White, 
 The Star of Bethlehem. 7. J. Keats' Poems. 
 
268 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 8. Gem of the crimson-colour'd Even, 
 
 Companion of retiring day, 
 Why at the closing gates of heaven 
 Beloved Star, dost thou delay ? 
 
 So fair thy pensile beauty burns 
 
 When soft the tear of twilight flows ; 
 
 So due thy plighted love returns 
 
 To chambers brighter than the rose ; 
 
 To Peace, to Pleasure, and to Love 
 So kind a star thou seem'st to be, 
 
 Sure some enamour'd orb above 
 
 Descends and burns to meet with thee ! 
 
 9. [Thou art, oh God,] 
 
 When night, with wings of starry gloom, 
 O'ershadows all the earth and skies. 
 
 1. Ye stars ! which are the poetry of Heaven ! 
 
 * £ * * 
 
 ye are 
 
 A beauty and a mystery, 
 
 Morning. — 
 
 2. Light hath no tongue, but is all eye ; 
 
 3. When daylight was yet sleeping under the billow. 
 
 4. The morn is up again, the dewy morn, 
 
 With breath all incense., and with cheek all bloom, 
 Laughing the clouds away with playful scorn, 
 And living, as if earth contain'd no tomb, — 
 And glowing into day : we may resume 
 The march of our existence : xcviii. 
 
 5. [Such was the golden hour that broke 
 Upon the world, when Hinda woke 
 From her long trance, ]* 
 
 How calm, how beautiful comes on 
 The stilly hour, when storms are gone ; 
 When warring winds have died away, 
 And clouds, beneath the glancing ray, 
 Melt off, and leave the land and sea 
 Sleeping in bright tranquillity, — 
 
 8. T. Campbell, To the Evening Star. 9. Moore's 
 Poems, Sacred Songs. 1. Byron's Poems. 2. Dr. J. 
 Donne, The break of day. 3. Moore's Irish Melodies, III 
 Omens. 4. Childe Harold, c. iii. 5. Lalla Rookh. 
 
 * These lines conclude those following. 
 
MORNING, ETC. 269 
 
 Fresh as if Day again were born, 
 Again upon the lap of Morn ! — 
 When the light blossoms, rudely torn 
 And scatter'd at the whirlwind's will, 
 Hang floating in the pure air still, 
 Filling it all with precious balm, 
 In gratitude for this sweet calm ; — 
 And every drop the thunder-showers 
 Have left upon the grass and flowers 
 Sparkles, as 'twere that lightning-gem 
 Whose liquid flame is born of them ! 
 
 When, 'stead of one unchanging breeze, 
 There blow a thousand gentle airs, 
 And each a different perfume bears, — 
 
 As if the loveliest plants and trees 
 Had vassal breezes of their own 
 To watch and wait on them alone, 
 And waft no other breath than theirs : 
 When the blue waters rise and fall, 
 In sleepy sunshine mantling all ; 
 And ev'n that swell the tempest leaves 
 Is like the full and silent heaves 
 Of lovers' hearts, when newly blest, 
 Too newly to be quite at rest ! 
 Calm. — 
 
 6. All heaven and earth are still : From the high host 
 Of stars, to the lull'd lake and mountain-coast 
 
 All is concenter'd in a life intense. lxxxix. 
 
 7. ' Now sleeps the crimson petal, now the white ; 
 
 Nor waves the cypress in the palace walk ; 
 Nor winks the gold fin in the porphyry font : 
 The fire-fly wakens : waken thou with me. 
 
 Now droops the milkwhite peacock like a ghost, 
 And like a ghost she glimmers on to me. 
 
 Now lies the Earth all Danae to the stars, 
 And all thy heart lies open unto me. 
 
 Now slides the silent meteor on, and leaves 
 A shining furrow, as thy thoughts in me. 
 
 Now folds the lily all her sweetness up, 
 And slips into the bosom of the lake : 
 So fold thyself, my dearest, and so slip 
 Into my bosom and be lost in me.' 
 
 6. Byron's Childe Harold, c. iii. 7. Tennyson, The 
 Princess. 
 
2 70 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 8. To tearless eyes and hearts at ease 
 To leafy shore and sun-bright seas, 
 That lay beneath the mountain height, 
 Had been a fair enchanting sight. 
 'Twas one of those ambrosial eves 
 
 A day of storm so often leaves 
 
 At its calm setting — when the West 
 
 Opens her golden bowers of rest, 
 
 And a moist radiance from the skies 
 
 Shoots trembling down, as from the eyes 
 
 Of some meek penitent, whose last, 
 
 Bright hours atone for dark ones past, 
 
 And whose sweet tears, o'er wrong forgiven, 
 
 Shine, as they fall, with light from heaven ! 
 
 'Twas stillness all — the winds that late 
 
 Had rush'd through Kerman's almond groves, 
 And shaken from her bowers of date 
 
 That cooling feast the traveller loves, 
 Now lull'd to languor, scarcely curl 
 
 The Green-Sea wave, whose waters gleam 
 Limpid, as if her mines of pearl 
 
 Were melted all to form the stream. 
 And her fair islets, small and bright, 
 
 With their green shores reflected there, 
 Look like those Peri-isles of light, 
 
 That hung by spell-work in the air. 
 
 Rainbow. — 
 
 8*. There is a bridge that's built of pearls, 
 Across a grey sea arching fair ; 
 Rear'd in a trice, where giddy whirls 
 The brain, it mounts the realms of air. 
 
 9. Sisters six without a brother 
 
 Born of wondrous parents we ; 
 
 Grave and solemn is our mother, 
 
 And our father blythe and free. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Caves where darkness dwells forsaking, 
 
 Where 'tis day we love to be, 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Shines the king in pomp and splendour, 
 All his glory we bestow. 
 
 8. Lalla Rookh. 8*. Lambert's Poems from the German 
 Schiller, The Rainbow. 9. Ibid. The Colours. 
 
SOUND, ETC. 271 
 
 Sound. — 
 10. That strain again ; — it had a dying fall : 
 
 O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south, 
 That breathes upon a bank of violets, 
 Stealing and giving odour. 
 
 1. Hark ! Music speaks from out the woods and streams ; 
 
 Amidst the winds, amidst the harmonious rain ; 
 It fills the voice with sweets, the eye with beams ; 
 It stirs the heart ; it charms the sting from pain. 
 
 2. Each sound, too, here to languishment inclined, 
 Lulled the weak bosom, and induced ease ; 
 Aerial music in the warbling wind, 
 
 At distance rising oft, by small degrees, 
 Nearer and nearer came, till o'er the trees 
 It hung, and breathed such soul-dissolving airs 
 As did, alas ! with soft perdition please : 
 Entangled deep in its enchanting snares, 
 The listening heart forgets all duties and all cares. 
 * * * * 
 
 Near the pavilions where we slept, still ran 
 Soft-tinkling streams, and dashing waters fell, 
 And sobbing breezes sighed, and oft began 
 (So worked the wizard,) wintry storms to swell, 
 As heaven and earth they would together mell : 
 
 seemed to call 
 
 The demons of the tempest, growling fell, 
 Yet the least entrance found they none at all, 
 Whence sweeter grew our sleep, secure in massy hall. 
 
 Night. — 
 
 3. The day is done, and the darkness 
 
 Falls from the wings of Night, 
 As a feather is wafted downward 
 From an eagle in his flight. 
 
 Clouds. — 
 
 1*. Sometimes we see a cloud that's dragonish ; 
 A vapour, sometimes like a bear, or lion, 
 
 a pendant rock, 
 
 * * * * * * 
 
 That which is now a horse, even with a thought, 
 The rack dislimns ; and makes it indistinct, 
 As water is in water. 
 
 10. Twelfth Night. 1. B. Cornwall, Music. 2. Thom- 
 son's Castle of Indolence. 3. H. W. Longfellow's Poems, 
 The day is done. 1*. Antony and Cleopatra, Act. iv. sc. 12. 
 
272 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 2 I sift the snow on the mountains below, 
 
 And their great pines groan aghast ; 
 And all the night, 'tis my pillow white, 
 While I sleep in the arms of the blast. 
 Fire. — 
 
 3. Thus is one heat from many embers felt. 
 
 4. In a house of stone I dwell, 
 
 Where I lie conceal'd, and sleep, 
 Till from out my quiet cell 
 
 Called by clash of steel, I leap. 
 Lightning. — 
 
 5. There's one among the serpent breed, 
 
 Engender'd not on earth, 
 . Without a rival in its speed, 
 A rival in its wrath. 
 
 Upon its prey with fearful cry 
 
 It darts with crushing force ; 
 And stricken low, together lie 
 
 The rider and his horse. 
 * * * 
 
 Once menaces the monster dire, 
 
 And threatens not again, 
 Dying itself in its own fire, 
 
 For as it slays 'tis slain. 
 Rainbow. — 
 
 6. Triumphant arch, that fill'st the sky, 
 
 When storms prepare to part, 
 I ask not proud philosophy 
 To teach me what thou art. 
 
 Still seem, as to my childhood's sight, 
 
 A midway station given, 
 For happy spirits to alight 
 
 Betwixt the earth and heaven. 
 
 Can all that optics teach, unfold 
 
 Thy form to please me so, 
 As when I dreamt of gems and gold, 
 
 Hid in thy radiant bow ? 
 
 When science from Creation's face, 
 
 Enchantment's veil withdraws, 
 What lovely visions yield their place 
 
 To cold material laws ! 
 
 2. Shelley, The Cloud. 3. Cary's Dante (Paradise), c. xix. 
 4. 5. Lambert's Poems from the German, (Schiller.) 6. T. 
 Campbell, To the Rainbow. 
 
SOUNDS. 273 
 
 Sounds. — 
 
 3. {the Guitar,) had learnt all harmonies 
 
 Of the plains and of the skies, 
 
 Of the forests and the mountains, 
 And the many-voiced fountains ; 
 The clearest echoes of the hills, 
 The softest notes of falling rills, 
 The melodies of birds and bees, 
 The murmuring of summer seas, 
 And pattering rain, and breathing dew, 
 And airs of evening ; and it knew 
 That seldom-heard mysterious sound 
 Which, driven on its diurnal round, 
 As it floats through boundless day, 
 Our world enkindles on its way. 
 
 4. Like the gale, that sighs along 
 
 Beds of oriental flowers, 
 Is the grateful breath of song, 
 
 That once was heard in happier hours ; 
 Fill'd with balm, the gale sighs on, 
 
 Though the flowers have sunk in death ; 
 So, when pleasure's dream is gone, 
 
 Its memory lives in Music's breath ! 
 
 5. Oh Music ! thy celestial claim 
 Is still resistless, still the same ; 
 
 And, faithful as the mighty sea 
 To the pale star that o'er its realm presides, 
 The spell-bound tides 
 Of human passion rise and fall for thee ! 
 
 6. And that eternal, saddening sound 
 Of torrents in the glen beneath, 
 
 As 'twere the ever-dark Profound 
 
 That rolls beneath the Bridge of Death. 
 
 7. There seems a floating whisper on the hill ; 
 But that is fancy, for the starlight dews 
 
 All silently their tears of love instil, 
 Weeping themselves away, till they infuse 
 Deep into nature's breast, the spirit of her hues. 
 
 Water. — 
 
 8. From centre to the circle, and so back 
 From circle to the centre, water moves 
 
 3. Shelley, To a lady with a Guitar. 4. Moore's Irish 
 Melodies. On Music. 5. Ibid., A melologue upon National 
 Music. 6. Ibid., Lalla Rookh. 7. Byron's Childe Harold, 
 c. iii. 87. 8. Cary's Dante {Paradise), c. xiv. 
 
 T 
 
2 74 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 In the round chalice, even as the blow 
 
 Impels it, inwardly, or from without. 
 
 Such was the image glanc'd into my mind, 
 
 As the great spirit 
 
 Water. — 
 
 9. Ye laughing streamlets, say, 
 
 Sporting with the sands, where do ye wend your way 
 
 From the fiow'rets flying, 
 
 To rocks and caverns hieing : 
 
 When ye might sleep in calmness and in peace, 
 
 Why hurry thus in wearying restlessness ? 
 
 1. When bright and gay the waters roll 
 
 In crystal rivers to the sea, 
 'Midst shining pearls, they take, my soul ! 
 
 Their sweetest, loveliest smile from thee ; 
 And when their dimpling currents flow, 
 They imitate thy laughing brow. 
 
 When morning from its dusky bed 
 
 Awakes with cold and slumbering eye, 
 • Ere yet he wears his tints of red, 
 He looks to see if thou art nigh, 
 To offer thee a diadem 
 Of every ruby, — every gem. 
 
 When spring leads on the joyous sun 
 He brightens on thy eyes, and takes 
 
 A nobler lustre, — when the dun 
 And darksome April first awakes, 
 
 And gives his better smiles to May, 
 
 He keeps for thee his fairest day. 
 
 2. The moving waters at their priestlike task 
 
 Of pure ablution round earth's human shores, 
 Or gazing on the new soft fallen mask 
 Of snow upon the mountains and the moors : — 
 Ocean. — 
 
 3. Time writes no wrinkles on thine azure brow — 
 
 Such as creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now. 182. 
 * * # * 
 
 Dark-heaving ; — boundless, endless, and sublime. 183 
 
 4. - a matchless cataract, 
 
 Horribly beautiful ! 72 
 
 9. Bowring's Poetry of Spain (Francisco de Borja, 1663.) 
 1. Ibid., Suva's Smile. 2. Keats' Poems. 3. Byron's Childe 
 Harold, c. iv. 4. Ibid., c. iv. 
 
OCEAN. 275 
 
 5. Flow, softly flow, by lawn and lea, 
 
 A rivulet then a river : 
 No where by thee my steps shall be, 
 For ever and for ever. 
 
 But here will sigh thine alder tree, 
 
 And here thine aspen shiver ; 
 And here by thee will hum the bee, 
 
 For ever and for ever. 
 
 A thousand suns will stream on thee, 
 
 A thousand moons will quiver ; 
 But not by thee my steps shall be, 
 
 For ever and for ever. 
 
 6. 'Whence come you?' and the brook, why not? replies. 
 
 I come from haunts of coot and hern, 
 
 I make a sudden sally 
 And sparkle out among the fern, 
 
 To bicker down a valley. 
 
 By thirty hills I hurry down, 
 
 Or slip between the ridges, 
 By twenty thorps, a little town, 
 
 And half a hundred bridges. 
 
 Till last by Philip's farm I flow, 
 
 To join the brimming river, 
 For men may come and men may go, 
 
 But I go on for ever. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 I steal by lawns and grassy plots, 
 
 I stride by hazel covers ; 
 I move the sweet forget-me-nots 
 
 That grow for happy lovers. 
 
 I slip, I slide, I gloom, I glance, 
 
 Among my skimming swallows ; 
 I make the netted sunbeam dance 
 
 Against my sandy shallows. 
 
 I murmur under moon and stars 
 
 In brambly wildernesses ; 
 I linger by my shingly bars ; 
 
 I loiter round my cresses ; 
 
 And out again I curve and flow 
 
 To join the brimming river, 
 For men may come and men may go, 
 
 But I go on for ever. 
 
 5. Tennyson, A Farewell. 6. Ibid., The Brook. 
 
 T 2 
 
276 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Isle. — 
 
 7. There was a little lawny islet 
 By anemone and violet, 
 
 Like mosaic, paven : 
 And its roof was flowers and leaves 
 Which the summer's breath enweaves, 
 Where no sun, nor showers, nor breeze 
 Pierce the pines and tallest trees, 
 
 Each a gem engraven. 
 Girt by many an azure wave 
 With which the clouds and mountains gave 
 
 A lake's blue chasm. 
 
 Seasons. — 
 
 (Imagined state of climate on earth immediately after the 
 fall.) 
 
 8. Now from the north 
 
 Of Norumbega and the Samoed shore, 
 Bursting their brazen dungeon, arm'd with ice, 
 And snow, and hail, and stormy gust, and flaw, 
 Boreas, and Caecias, and Argestes loud, 
 
 And Thrascias rend the woods, and seas upturn ; 
 With adverse blast upturns them from the south 
 Notus, and Afer black with thund'rous clouds 
 From Serraliona ; thwart of these as fierce 
 Forth rush the Levant and the Ponent winds, 
 Urus and Zephyr with their lateral noise, 
 Sirocco and Libecchio. Thus began 
 Outrage from lifeless things ; 
 
 9. So forth issued the seasons of the year ; 
 
 First lusty spring, all dight in leaves and flowers 
 That freshly budded, and new blooms did bear, 
 In which a thousand birds had built their bowers, 
 
 Then came the jolly summer, being dight 
 In a thin silken cassock coloured green, 
 * * * * 
 
 Then came the autumn, all in yellow clad, 
 -:< * * * 
 
 Laden with fruits that made him laugh, — 
 
 Lastly came winter, clothed all in frieze, 
 Clattering his teeth for cold that did him chill. 
 
 7. Shelley, The Isle. 8. Earadise Lost. 9. Spenser's 
 Fairy Queen, Procession of the Seasons. 
 
SEASONS. 277 
 
 10. I love to go in the capricious days 
 
 Of April and hunt violets ; when the rain 
 Is in the blue cups trembling, and they nod 
 So gracefully to the kisses of the wind. 
 It may be deemed unmanly, but the wise 
 Read Nature like the manuscript of Heaven, 
 And call the flowers its poetry. 
 
 1. When youthful spring around us breathes, 
 Thy spirit warms her fragrant sigh. 
 
 2. 1 come, I come ! ye have call'd me long, 
 
 I come o'er the mountains with light and song ! 
 Ye may trace my step o'er the wakening earth, 
 By the winds which tell of the violet's birth, 
 By the primrose-stars in the shadowy grass, 
 By the green leaves opening as I pass. 
 
 I have breath'd on the South, and the chesnut-flowers, 
 By thousands, have burst from the forest-bowers, 
 And the ancient graves, and the fallen fanes, 
 Are veil'd with wreaths on Italian plains. 
 — But it is not for me, in my hour of bloom, 
 To speak of the ruin or the tomb ! 
 
 I have pass'd o'er the hills of the stormy North, 
 
 And the larch has hung all his tassels forth, 
 
 And the fisher is out on the sunny sea, 
 
 And the rein-deer bounds through the pasture free, 
 
 And the pine has a fringe of softer green, 
 
 And the moss looks bright, where my step has been. 
 
 3. Hang all your leafy banners out ! 
 
 4. When on the boughs the purple buds expand, 
 
 The banners of the vanguard of the spring, 
 And rivulets, rejoicing, rush and leap, 
 And wave their fluttering signals from the steep. 
 
 5. The brightest hour of unborn Spring 
 Through the winter wandering, 
 Found, it seems, the halcyon morn 
 To hoar February born ; 
 
 to. N. P. Willis, April. 1. Moore's Sacred Songs. 
 2. Mrs. Hemans, The Voice of Spring. 3. H. W. Long- 
 fellow, Daybreak. 4. Ibid., The Poet's Tale. 5. Shelley, 
 The Invitation. 
 
278 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Bending from Heaven, in azure mirth, 
 
 It kiss'd the forehead of the earth, 
 
 And smiled upon the silent sea, 
 
 And bade the frozen streams be free, 
 
 And waked to music all their fountains, 
 
 And breathed upon the frozen mountains, 
 
 And like a prophetess of May 
 
 Strew'd flowers upon the barren way, 
 * * * 
 
 Away, away 
 
 To the wild wood and the downs — 
 To the silent wilderness 
 Where the soul need not repress 
 Its music, lest it should not find 
 An echo in another's mind, 
 While the touch of Nature's art 
 Harmonizes heart to heart. 
 
 Radiant Sister of the Day 
 Awake ! arise ! and come away ! 
 To the wild woods and the plains, 
 To the pools where winter rains 
 Image all their roof of leaves, 
 Where the pine its garland weaves 
 Of sapless green, and ivy dun, 
 Round stems that never kiss the sun, 
 Where the lawns and pastures be 
 And the sandhills of the sea, 
 Where the melting hoar-frost wets 
 The daisy-star that never sets, 
 And wind-flowers and violets 
 Which yet join not scent to hue 
 Crown the pale year weak and new ; 
 When the night is left behind 
 In the deep east, dim and blind, 
 And the blue noon is over us, 
 And the multitudinous 
 Billows murmur at our feet, 
 Where the earth and ocean meet, 
 And all things seem only one 
 In the universal Sun. 
 
 6. O Winter, ruler of the inverted year, 
 
 Thy scatter'd hair with sleet like ashes fill'd, 
 Thy breath congeal'd upon thy lips, thy cheeks 
 Fringed with a beard made white with other snows 
 
 6. Cowper, The Task, b. iv. 
 
SEASONS. 279 
 
 Than those of age, thy forehead wrapp'd in clouds, 
 
 A leafless branch thy sceptre, and thy throne 
 
 A sliding car, indebted to no wheels, 
 
 But urged by storrns along its slippery way, 
 
 I love thee, all unlovely as thou seem'st, 
 
 And dreaded as thou art ! Thou hold'st the sun 
 
 A pris'ner in the yet undawning east, 
 
 Short'ning his journey between morn and noon, 
 
 And hurrying him, impatient of his stay, 
 
 Down to the rosy west ; 
 
 7. When first the fiery-mantled Sun 
 
 His heavenly race began to run, 
 Round the earth and ocean blue 
 His children four the seasons flew. 
 First in green apparel dancing, 
 
 The young Spring smiled with angel grace ; 
 Rosy Summer next advancing 
 
 Rush'd into her sire's embrace : — 
 Her bright-hair'd sire, who bade her keep 
 
 For ever nearest to his smiles, 
 On Calpe's olive-shaded steep 
 
 On India's citron-cover'd isles. 
 More remote and buxom-brown, 
 
 The Queen of vintage bow'd before his throne ; 
 A rich pomegranate gemm'd her crown, 
 
 A ripe sheaf bound her zone. 
 
 But howling Winter fled afar, 
 
 To hills that props the polar star, 
 
 * * * 
 
 Round the shore where loud Lofoden 
 Whirls to death the roaring whale, 
 
 * * * 
 
 Deflowering Nature's grassy robe, 
 And trampling on her faded form : — 
 
 Milder yet thy snowy breezes 
 
 Pour on yonder tented shores, 
 Where the Rhine's broad billow freezes, 
 
 Or the dark-brown Danube roars. 
 
 8. I dream'd that as I wander'd by the way 
 
 Bare Winter suddenly was chang'd to Spring, 
 And gentle odours led my steps astray, 
 Mix'd with a sound of waters murmuring 
 
 7. T. Campbell's Ode to Winter, (Germany, 1800.) 
 Shelley, >4 Dream of the Unknown. 
 
28o NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Along a shelving bank of turf, which lay 
 
 Under a copse, and hardly dared to fling 
 Its green arms round the bosom of the stream, 
 But kiss'd it and then fled, as Thou mightest in 
 dream. 
 
 There grew pied wind-flowers and violets, 
 
 Daisies, those pearl'd Arcturi of the earth, 
 The constellated flower that never sets ; 
 
 Faint oxlips ; tender blue-bells, at whose birth 
 The sod scarce heaved ; and that tall flower that wets 
 It's mother's face with heaven-collected tears, 
 When the low wind, its playmate's voice, it hears. 
 
 And in the warm hedge grew lush eglantine, 
 
 Green cow-bind and the moonlight-colour'd May, 
 
 And cherry-blossoms, and white cups, whose wine 
 Was the bright dew yet drain'd not by the day ; 
 
 And wild roses, and ivy serpentine 
 
 With its dark buds and leaves, wandering astray; 
 
 And flowers azure, black, and streak'd with gold, 
 
 Fairer than any waken'd eyes behold. 
 
 And nearer to the river's trembling edge 
 
 There grow broad flag-flowers, purple prankt with 
 white. 
 
 And starry river-buds among the sedge, 
 And floating water-lilies, broad and bright, 
 
 Which lit the oak that overhung the hedge 
 
 With moonlight beams of their own watery light ; 
 
 And bulrushes, and reeds of such deep green 
 
 As soothed the dazzled eye with sober sheen. 
 
 Methought that of these visionary flowers 
 I made a nosegay, bound in such a way 
 
 That the same hues, which in their natural bowers 
 Were mingled or opposed, the like array 
 
 Kept these imprison'd children of the Hours 
 Within my hand, — and then, elate and gay, 
 
 I hasten'd to the spot whence I had come 
 
 That I might there present it — O ! to Whom ? 
 
 Storm. — 
 
 9. let fall 
 
 Your horrible pleasure. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 the pelting of this pitiless storm. 
 
 9. King Lear, Act iii. sc. 2. 
 
THE UNSTABLE. 28 I 
 
 Unstable. — 
 
 1. The waters are flashing, 
 The white hail is dashing, 
 The lightnings are glancing, 
 The hoar-spray is dancing — 
 
 Away ! 
 The whirlwind is rolling, 
 The thunder is tolling, 
 The forest is swinging, 
 The minster bells ringing — 
 
 Come away ! 
 The earth is like ocean, 
 Wreck-strewn and in motion : 
 Bird, beast, man and worm, 
 Have crept out of the storm — 
 
 Come away ! 
 
 * >!' * 
 
 While around the lashed ocean, 
 Like mountains in motion, 
 Is withdrawn and uplifted, 
 Sunk, shattered, and shifted, 
 To and fro. 
 
 2. Swifter far than summer's flight, 
 Swifter far than youth's delight, 
 Swifter far than happy night, 
 
 Art thou come and gone ; 
 As the earth when leaves are dead, 
 As the night when sleep is sped, 
 As the heart when joy is fled, 
 
 I am left lone, lone. 
 The swallow Summer comes again, 
 The owlet Night resumes her reign, 
 But the wild swan Youth is fain 
 
 To fly with thee, false as thou. 
 My heart each day desires the morrow, 
 Sleep itself is turned to sorrow, 
 Vainly would my winter borrow 
 
 Sunny leaves from any bough. 
 Lilies for a bridal bed, 
 Roses for a matron's head, 
 Violets for a maiden dead, 
 
 Pansies let my flowers be ; 
 On the living grave I bear, 
 Scatter them without a tear, 
 Let no friend, however dear, 
 
 Waste one hope, one fear for me. 
 
 1. Shelley, The Fugitives. 2. Ibid., A Lament. 
 
282 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 3. I know that all beneath the moon decays. 
 
 4. These our actors, 
 
 As I foretold you, were all spirits, and 
 Are melted into air, into thin air : 
 
 And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, 
 The cloud-capt towers, the gorgeous palaces, 
 The solemn temples, the great globe itself, 
 Yea, all which it inherit shall dissolve ; 
 And, like this unsubstantial pageant faded, 
 Leave not a rack behind : We are such stuff 
 As dreams are made of, and our little life 
 Is rounded with a sleep. 
 
 4*. Mercutio. True, I talk of dreams ; 
 
 Which are the children of an idle brain. 
 Begot of nothing but vain fantasy; 
 Which is as thin of substance as the air; 
 And more inconstant than the wind, who wooes 
 Even now the frozen bosom of the north, 
 And, being anger'd, puffs, away from thence. 
 Turning his face to the dew-dropping south. 
 
 5. A court is like a garden shade ; 
 
 The courtiers and the flowers that rise 
 Too suddenly, 'neath changeful skies, 
 
 Oft sink into the dust and fade. 
 
 In short, we all are like thy flower, 
 And ever, both in weal and woe, 
 With strange perverseness, we bestow 
 
 Our thoughts on time's swift-fleeting hour. 
 
 1. 
 
 6. Tell me where's the violet fled, 
 
 Late so gayly blowing ; 
 Springing under Flora's tread, 
 
 Choicest sweets bestowing. 
 Swain, the vernal scene is o'er, 
 And the violet blooms no more I 
 
 11. 
 Say, where hides the blushing rose, 
 
 Pride of fragrant morning ; 
 Garland meet for Beauty's brows ; 
 
 Hill and dale adorning. 
 
 3. Drummond of Hawthornden, Sonnet. 4. The Tempest. 
 4.* Romeo and Juliet. 5. Bowring's Batavian Anthology, 
 jferemias de Decker, The too early opening flower. 
 6. Taylor's German Poetry, J. G. Jacobi, Elegy. 
 
THE UNSTABLE. 283 
 
 Swain, alas, the summer's fled, 
 And the hapless rose is dead ! 
 
 in. 
 Bear me then to yonder rill, 
 
 Late so freely flowing, 
 Wat'ring many a daffodil 
 
 On its margin growing. 
 Sun and wind exhaust its store ; 
 Yonder rivulet glides no more ! 
 
 IV. 
 
 Lead me to the bow'ry shade, 
 
 Late with roses flaunting ; 
 Lov'd resort of youth and maid, 
 
 Amorous ditties chaunting. 
 Hail and storm with fury show'r ; 
 Leafless mourns the rifled bow'r. 
 
 v. 
 
 Where's the silver-footed maid, 
 
 With curling flaxen tresses ; 
 Oft I've met her in the glade, 
 
 Gathering water-cresses? 
 Swain, how short is Beauty's bloom ? 
 Seek her in the grassy tomb. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Whither roves the tuneful swain, 
 
 Who, of rural pleasures ; 
 Rose and violet, rill and plain, 
 
 Sung in deftest measures ? 
 Swift Life's fairest vision flies, 
 Death has closed the Poet's eyes! 
 
 7. Who can pitying see the flowery race, 
 
 Shed by the Morn, their new flushed bloom resign, 
 Before the parching beam ? So fade the fair, 
 When fevers revel through their azure veins. 
 
 8. fair Wyoming, 
 
 Although the wild -flower on thy ruin'd wall, 
 And roofless homes, a sad remembrance bring 
 Of what thy gentle people did befall. 
 
 9. fled 
 
 Fast as the shapes of mingled shade and mist, 
 That lurk in the glens of a twilight grove, 
 
 Flee from the morning beam. 
 
 7. Thomson's Seasons, Summer. 8. Campbell's Gertrude 
 of Wyoming, g. Queen Mab. 
 
284 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Bees. — 
 
 10. So work the honey bees ; 
 
 Creatures, that, by a rule in nature, teach 
 The art of order to a peopled kingdom. 
 They have a king, and officers of sorts : 
 Where some, like magistrates, correct at home ; 
 Others, like merchants, venture trade abroad ; 
 Others, like soldiers, armed in their stings, 
 Make boot upon the summer's velvet buds ; 
 Which pillage they with merry march bring home 
 To the tent-royal of their emperor : 
 Who, busy'd in his majesty, surveys 
 The singing masons building roofs of gold ; 
 The civil citizens kneading up the honey ; 
 And poor mechanic porters crowding in 
 Their heavy burdens at his narrow gate ; 
 The sad-ey'd justice, with his surly hum, 
 Delivering o'er to executors pa!e 
 The lazy, yawning drone. 
 
 1. A populous solitude of bees and birds, 
 
 And fairy-form'd and many-coloured things. 102. 
 
 Birds. — 
 
 2. As the rooks, at dawn of day, 
 
 Bestirring them to dry their feathers chill, 
 
 Some speed their way a-field, and homeward some, 
 Returning, cross their flight, while some abide 
 And wheel round their airy lodge ; so seem'd 
 That glitterance, wafted on alternate wing, 
 As upon certain stair it met, and clash'd 
 Its shining, 
 
 3. A widow bird sate mourning for her Love 
 
 Upon a wintry bough ; 
 The frozen wind crept on above, 
 The freezing stream below. 
 
 There was no leaf upon the forest bare, 
 
 No flower upon the ground, 
 And little motion in the air 
 
 Except the mill-wheel's sound. 
 
 Trees. — 
 
 4. O leave this barren spot to me ! 
 
 Spare, woodman, spare the Beechen-tree ! 
 
 10. King Henry V. 1. Childe Harold, c. iii. 
 2. Gary's Dante (Paradise), c. xxi. 3. Shelley's Poems. 
 4. Campbell, The Beech-tree s Petition. 
 
TREES. 285 
 
 Though bush or flowerets never grow 
 My dark, unwarming shade below ; 
 Nor Summer-bud perfume the dew, 
 Of rosy blush, or yellow hue : 
 
 Yet leave this barren spot to me : 
 
 5. For I have seen 
 
 The thorn frown rudely all the winter long 
 And after bear the rose upon its top ; 
 
 6. while we taste the fragrance of the rose, 
 
 Glows not her blush the fairer ? 
 * * * 
 
 Of colours changing from the splendid rose, 
 To the pale violet's dejected hue. 
 
 7. 'Tis the last Rose of Summer, 
 
 Left blooming alone ; 
 All her lovely companions 
 
 Are faded and gone ; 
 No flow'r of her kindred, 
 
 No rose-bud is nigh, 
 To reflect back her flushes, 
 
 Or give sigh for sigh ! 
 
 8. Let Burns and old Chaucer unite 
 
 The praise of the Daisy to sing, — 
 Let Wordsworth of Celandine write, 
 
 And crown her the queen of the Spring ; 
 The Hyacinth's classical fame 
 
 Let Milton embalm in his verse ; 
 Be mine the glad task to proclaim 
 
 The charms of the untrumpeted Furze. 
 
 * * -ji- 
 lt is bristled with thorns, I confess ; 
 
 But so is the much-flatter'd Rose : 
 Is the Sweet-brier lauded the less 
 
 Because among prickles it grows ? 
 
 * *• * 
 
 See ! Nature with Midas-like touch, 
 
 Here turns a whole common to gfold. 
 
 5. Cary's Dante {Paradise), c. xiii. 6. Akenside's 
 Pleasures of Imagination. 7. Moore, The Last Rose of 
 Summer. 8. Horace Smith, The Furze-Bush. 
 
286 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 9. Sweet is the rose, but grows upon a brere ; 
 Sweet is the juniper, but sharp his bough ; 
 Sweet is the eglantine, but pricketh near ; 
 Sweet is the fir-bloom, but his branches rough ; 
 Sweet is the cypress, but his rind is tough ; 
 Sweet is the nut, but bitter is his pill; 
 
 Sweet is the broom-flowre, but yet sour enough ; 
 And sweet is moly, but his root is ill : 
 So every sweet with sour is tempered still. 
 
 Flowers. — 
 
 10. I love all things the seasons bring, 
 All buds that start, all birds that sing, 
 
 All leaves from white to jet; 
 All the sweet words that summer sends. 
 When she recalls her flowery friends, 
 
 But chief— the Violet. 
 
 I love, how much I love the rose, 
 
 On whose soft lips the south-wind blows, 
 
 In pretty amorous threat : 
 The lily paler than the moon, 
 The odorous wonderous month of June, 
 
 Yet more — the Violet. 
 
 1. I wander'd lonely as a cloud 
 
 That floats on high o'er vales and hills, 
 When all at once I saw a crowd, 
 A host of golden daffodils, 
 Beside the lake, beneath the trees 
 Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. 
 
 Continuous as the stars that shine, 
 And twinkle on the milky way, 
 They stretch'd in never-ending line 
 Along the margin of a bay : 
 Ten thousand saw I at a glance 
 Tossing their heads in sprightly dance. 
 
 The waves beside them danced, but they 
 
 Out-did the sparkling waves in glee : — 
 
 A Poet could not but be gay 
 
 In such a jocund company! 
 
 I gazed — and gazed — but little thought 
 
 What wealth the show to me had brought; 
 
 9. E. Spenser, Sonnet. 10. B. Cornwall, The Violet. 
 1. Wordsworth, The Daffodils. 
 
PERFUME, ETC. 287 
 
 For oft, when on my couch I lie 
 In vacant or in pensive mood, 
 They flash upon that inward eye 
 Which is the bliss of solitude ; 
 And then my heart with pleasure fills, 
 And dances with the daffodils. 
 
 Perfume. — 
 
 2. The perfume breathing round, 
 
 Like a pervading spirit ; — the still sound 
 Of falling waters, lulling as the song 
 
 Of Indian bees at sunset, when they throng 
 
 Around the fragrant Nilica, and deep 
 
 In its blue blossoms hum themselves to sleep. 
 
 Motion. — 
 
 3. Tell me, thou star, whose wings of light 
 Speed thee in thy fiery flight, 
 
 In what cavern of the night 
 
 Will thy pinions close now ? 
 
 Tell me, moon, thou pale and grey 
 Pilgrim of heaven's homeless way, 
 In what depth of night or day 
 Seekest thou repose now ? 
 
 Weary wind, who wanderest 
 Like the world's rejected guest, 
 Hast thou still some secret nest 
 On the tree or billow ? 
 
 4. The opening morn, resplendent noon, 
 
 With heaven's bright glory graced, 
 
 , and night's silent moon 
 
 Tell nought remains at rest. 
 
 The comet, wandering far on high, 
 'Midst countless planets placed, 
 Roll ceaseless through the boundless sky — 
 
 The tide returns, and ebbs again 
 
 The river hies with haste, 
 With rills and springs into the main — 
 
 The various seasons of the year, — 
 Midst spring with flowery vest, 
 
 2. Lalla Rookh. 3. Shelley, The World's Wanderers. 
 4. David Grant, Action a Law of Nature, 
 
288 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Bright summer, autumn, winter's skies, 
 Tell * * . 
 
 Thus day, and night, and star, and flood, 
 
 And seasons — all attest 
 That, through the wondrous works of God, 
 There's nought remains at rest. 
 Man. — 
 
 i. thou hast the dew of thy youth. — 
 
 2. [Biron says of Armado,] A man of fire-new words — 
 
 3. I know you all, and will awhile uphold 
 The unyok'd humour of your idleness : 
 Yet herein will I imitate the sun ; 
 
 Who doth permit the base contagious clouds 
 To smother up his beauty from the world, 
 That, when he please again to be himself, 
 Being wanted, he may be more wonder'd at, 
 By breaking through the foul and ugly mists 
 Of vapours that did seem to strangle him. 
 
 4. When Nature her great masterpiece design'd, 
 And framed her last, best work, the human mind, 
 Her eye intent on all the mazy plan, 
 
 She form'd of various parts the various man. 
 
 5. [Mokanna — the veiled prophet], 
 
 He knew no more of fear than one who dwells 
 Beneath the tropics knows of icicles ! 
 
 Trouble. — 
 
 6. Troilus. But I am weaker than a woman's tear, 
 
 Tamer than sleep, fonder than ignorance ; 
 Less valiant than the virgin in the night, 
 And skill-less as unpractis'd infancy. 
 
 7. [ The veiled prophet of Kharassan.] 
 
 In every glance there broke, without control, 
 The flashes of a bright, but troubled soul, 
 Where sensibility still wildly play'd 
 Like lightning, round the ruins it had made ! 
 
 Action. — 
 
 8. Come as the winds come, when 
 
 Forests are rended, 
 Come as the waves come, when 
 Navies are stranded : 
 
 1. Psalm ex. 3. 2. Love's Labour Lost. 3. King 
 Henry IV., 1st Part, Act i. sc. 1. 4. Burns' First Epistle 
 to Mr. Graham. 5, 7. Moore's Lalla Rookh. 6. Troilus 
 and Cressida. 8. Scott's Gathering of Donald the Black. 
 
DEATH, ETC. 289 
 
 Faster come, faster come, 
 
 Faster and faster, 
 Chief, vassal, page and groom, 
 Tenant and master. 
 Death. — 
 
 9. See the leaves around us falling, 
 
 Dry and wither'd to the ground ; 
 Thus to thoughtless mortals calling, 
 In a sad and solemn sound : — 
 
 io . The hills, 
 
 Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun ; the vales 
 
 Stretching in pensive quietness between ; 
 
 The venerable woods — rivers that move 
 
 In majesty, and the complaining brooks 
 
 That make the meadows green ; and, poured 
 
 round all, 
 Old Ocean's gray and melancholy waste, — 
 Are but the solemn decorations all 
 Of the great tomb of man. The golden sun, 
 The planets, all the infinite host of heaven, 
 Are shining on the sad abodes of death, 
 Through the still lapse of ages. 
 
 Social. 
 Female Beauty. — 
 
 1. As at my window — all alone — 
 
 I stood about the break of day, 
 Upon my left Aurora shone, 
 
 To guide Apollo on his way. 
 Upon my right I could behold 
 My love, who comb'd her locks of gold ; 
 I saw the lustre of her eyes, 
 
 And, as a glance on me she cast ; 
 Cried, ' Gods retire behind your skies, 
 
 Your brightness is by hers surpass'd.' 
 As gentle Phcebe, when at night 
 
 She shines upon the earth below, 
 Pours forth such overwhelming light, 
 All meaner orbs must faintly glow. 
 Thus did my lady, on that day, 
 Eclipse Apollo's brighter ray, 
 Whereat he was so sore distrest 
 
 His face with clouds he overcast, 
 And I exclaim'd, ' That course is best, 
 Your brightness is by hers surpass'd.' 
 
 9. Bp. Home, The Emblems of Death. 10. Bryant's Thana- 
 topsis. 1. King Francis I., .Ballad (Oxenford's French Songs). 
 
 U 
 
290 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 2. She is fair, 
 Past compare, 
 
 One small hand her waist can span. 
 
 Eyes of light — 
 
 Stars, though bright, 
 Match those eyes you never can. 
 
 3. O happy Thames ! that didst my Stella bear, 
 I saw thyself, with many a smiling line 
 Upon thy cheerful face, joy's livery wear, 
 While those fair planets on thy streams did shine. 
 The boat for joy could not to dance forbear, 
 While wanton winds, with beauty so divine 
 Ravished, staid not, till in her golden hair 
 
 They did themselves, (O sweetest prison !) twine. 
 
 4. O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright ! 
 Her beauty hangs upon the cheek of night 
 Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear : 
 
 Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear ! 
 So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows, 
 As yonder lady o'er her fellows shows. 
 
 5. I thought her 
 
 As chaste as unsunn'd snow :■ 
 
 6. the beloved 
 
 Though every one of my words should be pearls of 
 
 great price ; 
 Still she doth not account them at all worthy of her 
 
 ears. 
 
 7. O that I were the nightingale, or the zephyr of the 
 
 morn, 
 That my path might lie amongst thy fragrant bowers ! 
 
 8. The face of the beloved, the sun, and the moon, are 
 
 all three one : 
 Her stature, the cypress, and the pine are all three one. 
 
 9. If, for once only, she will show her face from the veil, 
 She will take the. diploma of beauty from the sun. 
 The tulip shall borrow bloom from her countenance ; 
 The hyacinth will grow furious at the sight of her curls. 
 
 1. Thy face hath shamed the rose, and thy tresses, the 
 
 spikenard, 
 The nightingale forsaketh the parterre, and flieth unto 
 thee. 
 
 2. Song, attributed to King Henry IV. (Oxenford's French 
 Songs.) 3. Sir P. Sidney, Sonnets. 4. Romeo and Juliet. 
 5. Cymbeline, 6, 7, 8, 9, 1, Raverty's Afghan Poetry. 
 
FEMALE BEAUTY. 29 I 
 
 2. These dark eyes of thine are, in themselves, black 
 
 calamities ; 
 
 3. A perfect garden is her lovely face, containing flowers 
 
 of every hue. 
 
 4. A draught like this 'twere vain to seek, 
 
 No grape can such supply ; 
 It steals its tint from Leila's cheek, 
 Its brightness from her eye. 
 
 5. Then to the flood she rushed; the parted flood 
 Its lovely guest with closing waves received ; 
 And, every beauty softening, every grace 
 Flushing anew, a mellow lustre shed : 
 
 As shines the lily through the crystal mild ; 
 
 Or as the rose amid the mountain dew, 
 
 Fresh from Aurora's hand, more sweetly glows. 
 
 6. Why does azure deck the sky ? 
 
 'Tis to be like thine eyes of blue ; 
 Why is red the rose's dye ? 
 
 Because it is thy blushes' hue. 
 All that's fair, by love's decree, 
 Has been made resembling thee ! 
 
 Why is falling snow so white, 
 
 But to be like thy bosom fair ? 
 Why are solar beams so bright ? 
 
 That they may seem thy golden hair ! 
 All that's bright, by love's decree, 
 Has been made resembling thee ! 
 
 Why are nature's beauties felt ? 
 
 Oh ! 'tis thine in her we see ! 
 Why has music power to melt ? 
 
 Oh ! because it speaks like thee. 
 All that's sweet, by love's decree, 
 Has been made resembling thee ! 
 
 7. Oh ! fair as heaven and chaste as light ! 
 
 8. Whence that aery bloom of thine, 
 
 Like a lily which the sun 
 Looks thro' in the sad decline, 
 And a rose-bush leans upon, 
 
 2, 3. Raverty's Afghan Poetry. 4. Dr. J. D. Carlyle's 
 Specimens of Arabian Poetry. 5. The Seasons. 6. Moore, 
 Song. 7. Ibid., A Warning. 8. Tennyson's Adeline. 
 
 .U 2 
 
292 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Hast thou heard the butterflies 
 What they say betwixt their wings ? 
 
 Or in stillest evenings 
 With what voice the violet woos 
 To his heart the silver dews ? 
 
 Or when little airs arise, 
 How the merry bluebell rings 
 To the mosses underneath ? 
 Hast thou looked upon the breath 
 
 Of the lilies at sunrise ? 
 Wherefore that faint smile of thine, 
 Shadowy, dreaming Adeline ? 
 
 9. Long while I sought to what I might compare 
 
 Those powerful eyes which lighten my dark spright, 
 Yet find I nought on earth to which I dare 
 Resemble th' image of the goodly light. 
 Not to the sun, for they do shine by night ; 
 Nor to the moon, for they are changed never : 
 Nor to the stars, for they have purer sight ; 
 Nor to the lire, for they consume not ever; 
 Nor to the lightning, for they still presever ; 
 Nor to the diamond, for they are more tender ; 
 Nor unto crystal, for nought may them sever ; 
 Nor unto glass, such baseness mought offend her : 
 Then to the Maker self they likest be, 
 Whose light doth lighten all that here we see. 
 
 Watching. — 
 
 1. E'en as the bird, who midst the leafy bower 
 
 Has, in her nest, sat darkling through the night, 
 With her sweet brood, impatient to descry 
 Their wished looks, and to bring home their food, 
 In the fond quest unconscious of her toil ; 
 She, of the time prevenient, on the spray, 
 That overhangs their couch, with wakeful gaze 
 Expects the sun ; nor ever, till the dawn, 
 Removeth from the east her eager ken, 
 So stood the dame erect, and bent her glance 
 Wistfully. * * * 
 
 2. And as a willow keeps 
 
 A patient watch over the stream that creeps 
 
 Windingly by it, so the quiet maid 
 
 Held her in peace : so that a whispering blade 
 
 9. E. Spenser, Sonnet. 1. Cary's Dante {Paradise), 
 
 c. xxiii. 2. Keats' Endymion, B. 1. 
 
LOVE. 293 
 
 Of grass, a wailful gnat, a bee bustling 
 
 Down in the blue-bells, or a wren light rustling 
 
 Among sear leaves and twigs, might all be heard. 
 
 Love. — 
 
 3. Ye tradeful Merchants ! that with weary toil 
 
 Do seek most precious things to make your gain, 
 
 And both the Indias of their treasure spoil, 
 
 What needeth you to seek so far in vain ? 
 
 For, lo ! my love doth in herself contain 
 
 All this world's riches that may far be found. 
 
 If saphyrs, lo ! her eyes be saphyrs plain ; 
 
 If rubies, lo ! her lips be rubies sound ; 
 
 If pearls, her teeth be pearls, both pure and round ; 
 
 If ivory, her forehead ivory ween ; 
 
 If gold, her locks are finest gold on ground ; 
 
 If silver, her fair hands are silver sheen : 
 
 But that which fairest is, but few behold, 
 
 Her mind, adorned with virtues manifold. 
 
 4. The rolling wheel that runneth often round, 
 The hardest steel in tract of time doth tear; 
 And drizzling drops, that often do redound 
 The firmest flint doth in continuance wear: 
 
 . Yet cannot I, with many a dropping tear, 
 And long entreaty, soften her hard heart. 
 
 5. So oft as I her beauty do behold, 
 And therewith do her cruelty compare, 
 
 I marvel of what substance was the mould, 
 
 The which her made att once so cruel fair. 
 
 Not earth, for her high thoughts more heavenly are : 
 
 Not water, for her love doth burn like fire ; 
 
 Not air, for she is not so light or rare ; 
 
 Not fire, for she doth freeze with faint desire ; 
 
 Then needs another element inquire, 
 
 Whereof she mote be made, that is the sky ; 
 
 For to the heaven her haughty looks inspire, 
 
 And eke her love is pure immortal hy. 
 
 Then sith to heaven ye likened are the best, 
 
 Be like in mercy as in all the rest. 
 
 6. The forward violet thus did I chide ; — 
 
 Sweet thief, whence did thou steal thy sweet that 
 
 smells, 
 If not from my love's breath ? The purple pride 
 Which on thy soft cheek for complexion dwells, 
 In my love's veins thou hast too grossly dyed. 
 
 3, 4, 5. Spenser's Sonnets. 6. Shakspeare's Sonnets. 
 
294 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 The lily I condemned for thy hand, 
 And buds of marjoram had stolen thy hair : 
 The roses fearfully on thorns did stand, 
 One blushing shame, another white despair ; 
 A third, nor red nor white, had stolen of both, 
 And to his robbery had annexed thy breath ; 
 But for this theft, in pride of all his growth, 
 A vengeful canker eat him up to death. 
 
 More flowers I noted, yet I none could see, 
 But sweet or colour it had stolen from thee. 
 
 7. Shall I compare thee to a summer's day ? 
 Thou art more lovely and more temperate : 
 Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, 
 And summer's lease hath all too short a date : 
 Sometimes too hot the eye of heaven shines, 
 And often is his gold complexion dimmed ; 
 And every fair from fair sometimes declines, 
 
 By chance, or nature's changing course, untrimmed ; 
 But thy eternal summer shall not fade, 
 Nor lose possession of that fair thou owst ; 
 Nor shall death brag thou wander'st in his shade, 
 When in eternal lines to time thou growest : 
 So long as man can breathe, or eyes can see, 
 So long lives this, and this gives life to thee. 
 
 8. As lead to grave in marble stone, 
 
 My song may pierce her heart as soon ; 
 
 The rocks do not so cruelly 
 Repulse the waves continually. 
 
 9. Ask me no more where Jove bestows, 
 When June is past, the fading rose ; 
 For in your beauties orient deep 
 These flow'rs, as in their causes, sleep. 
 
 Ask me no more, whither do stray 
 The golden atoms of the day ; 
 For, in pure love, heaven did prepare 
 Those powders to enrich your hair. 
 
 Ask me no more, whither doth haste 
 The Nightingale, when May is past ; 
 For in your sweet dividing throat 
 She winters, and keeps warm her note. 
 
 7. Shakspeare's Sonnets. 8. Sir T. Wiat, The Lover 
 Complaineth. 9. T. Carew, Song* 
 
LOVE. 295 
 
 Ask me no more, where those stars light, 
 That downwards fall in dead of night ; 
 For in your eyes they sit, and there 
 Fixed become, as in their sphere. 
 
 1. And we will sit upon the rocks, 
 Seeing the shepherds feed their flocks, 
 By shallow rivers, to whose falls 
 Melodious birds sing madrigals. 
 
 And I will make thee beds of roses, 
 And a thousand fragrant posies, 
 And a cap of flowers, and a kirtle, 
 Embroider'd all with leaves of myrtle ; 
 
 And a gown made of the finest wool, 
 Which from our pretty lambs we pull ; 
 Fair lined slippers for the cold, 
 With buckles of the purest gold ; 
 
 And a belt of straw and ivy-buds, 
 With coral clasps and amber studs ; 
 And if these pleasures may thee move, 
 Come live with me and be my love. 
 
 2. [The Passionate Lover exclaims] 
 
 Not he who reasons best, this wisdom knows : 
 Ears only drink what rapt'rous tongues disclose. 
 Nor fruitless deem the reed's heart-piercing pain : 
 See sweetness dropping from the parted cane. 
 
 New plans for wealth your fancies would invent ; 
 Yet shells, to nourish pearls, must lie content. 
 
 3. With thee, fair plunderer of hearts ! a dungeon would 
 
 seem delightful as a bed of roses. 
 
 4. O, my beloved ! thy brow is like a sword ; thy hair 
 
 like a chain; thy eyelashes like arrows; thy 
 bosom's garden is like the vale of Cashmire ; thy 
 beauty is the conqueror of the world. 
 
 5. Of the two tresses of thy hair I will spin two strings 
 
 for my guitar. * * 
 
 Thy height and shape are like unto a cypress, naz. 
 Thy two eyes are like those of a hawk. * * 
 
 1. C. Marlow, The Passionate Shepherd to his Love. 
 2. A Translation by Sir W. jfones. (S. Rousseau's Persian 
 Literature.) 3. Ibid. 4,5. Alex. Chodzko's Persian Poetry. 
 
296 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 6. In the blue horizon's beaming, 
 
 Thee, sweet maid ! alone I see ; 
 In the silver wavelet's streaming, 
 
 Thee, sweet maiden ! only thee. 
 Thee, in day's resplendent noonlight, 
 
 Glancing from the sun afar ; 
 Thee, in midnight's softer moonlight ; 
 
 Thee, in every trembling star. 
 Wheresoe'er I go, I meet thee ; 
 Wheresoe'er I stay, I greet thee ; 
 
 Following always — everywhere : 
 
 Cruel maiden ! O, forbear ! 
 
 7. She sleeps ; — Amaryllis 
 
 Midst flowrets is laid, 
 And roses and lilies 
 
 Make the sweet shade : 
 
 The maiden is sleeping, 
 
 Where, through the green hills, 
 
 Manzanares is creeping 
 Along with his rills. 
 
 Wake not Amaryllis, 
 
 Ye winds in the glade ! 
 Where roses and lilies 
 
 Make the sweet shade. 
 
 The sun, while upsoaring, 
 
 Yet tarries awhile, 
 The bright rays adoring, 
 
 Which stream from her smile. 
 
 The wood-music still is ; 
 
 To rouse her afraid, 
 Where roses and lilies 
 
 Make the sweet shade. 
 
 8. In the bosom of April 
 
 The sun midst flowers is laid ; 
 His pillow is of jasmins, 
 
 And the painted meadows his bed : 
 The rivulet gently flowing 
 
 Is his sweet lullaby. 
 See by yon grove of myrtles, 
 Cloris sleeping tranquilly. 
 
 6. Bowring's Magyar Poems, [A. Kisfaludy) 7, 8. Ibid., 
 Poetry of Spain, 
 
LOVE. 297 
 
 The sun calls forth the odours 
 
 From Daphne's laurel grove — 
 The incense is of emeralds, 
 
 An holocaust of love. 
 
 9. Ask the mariner * * 
 
 * >:< * # 
 
 If wave, or star, or friendly gales, 
 Are half so fair as she. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Ask the shepherd * * 
 
 * * * * 
 
 If the valley's lap, or the sun-crown'd rocks, 
 Are half so fair as she. 
 
 1. Hard is yon rock, around whose head, 
 Unfelt, the rudest tempests blow ; 
 And chilling cold the silver snow 
 
 On nature's ample bosom spread. 
 But harder is that heart of thine, 
 And colder all its frozen streams, 
 Where passion ne'er inscribed a line, 
 And love's warm sunshine never gleams. 
 
 Deaf as the surges of the sea 
 
 To the loud plaint of misery, 
 
 Though less than thou unkind and rude : 
 
 Dark is the evening's dying fall, — 
 
 But what are these, — or aught, or all, 
 
 To a tired spirit's solitude ? 
 
 2. Now appears the star of Venus, 
 
 Sol's last ray the mountain gilds, 
 While the night, in dusky mantle, 
 
 Travels o'er the darkening fields. 
 See yon moorish warrior flying 
 
 * * * 
 
 To the careless winds of heaven, 
 
 To the rocks and woods he cries ; 
 Nought but pitying Echo hears him — 
 
 Pitying Echo still replies. 
 1 Zayde ! — Zayde ! — far more cruel 
 
 Than the wreck-absorbing wave ; 
 
 Harder than the hardest mountain, 
 
 Whose old feet the waters lave ; 
 * * * 
 
 9. Bowring's Poetry of Spain, Gil Vicente, 1562. 1. Ibid. 
 F. de Herrera. 2. Ibid.* Romance. 
 
298 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Wilt thou twine thy youthful tendrils 
 
 Round a proud and rugged tree ; 
 Leaving mine all stripp'd and blasted ; 
 
 Flowerless — fruitless, left by thee ? 
 
 3. Were mine the wealth of Croesus old ; 
 Had I as many diamonds bright 
 
 As leaves that shake in summer's light, 
 
 Or sands o'er which the deep hath rolled ;■ — 
 
 Had I as many purest pearls 
 
 As grass blades hang upon the lea, 
 
 Or ripples dance along the sea 
 
 When o'er its breast the zephyr curls ; — 
 
 Had I a palace, crystal built, 
 
 And filled as full of golden bars 
 
 As yonder heaven is filled with stars 
 
 When evening fair the skies hath gilt ; — 
 
 Like lordly knights and kingly earls 
 
 With orders were I titled o'er 
 
 As thick as waves that kiss the shore 
 
 When Wind his banner bread unfurls ; — 
 
 I swear by yon bright worlds above, 
 
 I'd give them all this blessed night 
 
 To meet beneath this fair moonlight, 
 
 And clasp thee in my arms, my Love ! 
 
 4. Were I as base as is the lowly plain, 
 
 And you, my Love, as high as heaven above, 
 Yet should the thoughts of me your humble swain 
 Ascend to heaven, in honour of my Love. 
 Were I as high as heaven above the plain, 
 And you, my Love, as humble and as low 
 As are the deepest bottoms of the main, 
 Wheresoe'er you were, with you my love should g . 
 Were you the earth, dear Love, and I skies, 
 My love should shine on you like to the sun, 
 And look upon you with ten thousand eyes 
 Till heaven wax'd blind, and till the world were done. 
 Wheresoe'er I am, below, or else above you, 
 Wheresoe'er you are, my heart shall truly love you. 
 
 5. Over the mountains 
 And over the waves, 
 Under the fountains 
 And under the graves ; 
 
 3. W. R. Alger's Poetry of the East, (The Lover's Offer). 
 4. J. Sylvester, Love's Omnipresence. 5. Anon., The great 
 Adventurer. 
 
LOVE. 299 
 
 Under the floods that are deepest, 
 Which Neptune obey ; 
 Over rocks that are steepest 
 Love will find out the way. 
 
 6. I'll love thee as the bee the flower 
 
 In which the fragrant honey lies, 
 As nightingales the evening hour, 
 And as the star adores the skies. 
 
 7. If they knew it, the little flow'rets, 
 
 How deeply wounded my heart, 
 I ween they would all weep with me 
 To heal its aching smart. 
 
 And if the nightingales knew it, 
 
 How sick I am, — how sad, 
 They fain would carol for me 
 
 Their song so soothing and glad. 
 
 And knew they, the golden starlets, 
 
 And knew they of my woe, 
 They'd leave their high habitations 
 
 To comfort me here below. 
 
 But none of all these can know it,— 
 
 One only knoweth my smart ; 
 'Tis she who herself hath riven 
 
 And torn asunder my heart. 
 
 8. The fountains mingle with the river, 
 And the rivers with the ocean, 
 
 The winds of heaven mix for ever 
 With a sweet emotion ; 
 Nothing in the world is single, 
 All things by a law divine 
 In one another's being mingle — 
 Why not I with thine. 
 
 See the mountains kiss high heaven 
 And the waves clasp one another; 
 No sister flower would be forgiven 
 If it disdain'd its brother ; 
 And the sunlight clasps the earth, 
 And the moonbeams kiss the sea — 
 What are all these kissings worth, 
 If thou kiss not me ? 
 
 6. Oxenford's French Songs (E. Gola). 7. Dulcken's 
 German Songs (H. Heine). 8. Shelley, Love's Philosophy. 
 
300 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 9. And in the midst of this wide quietness 
 A rosy sanctuary will I dress 
 With the wreath'd trellis of a working brain, 
 
 With buds, and bells, and stars without a name, 
 With all the gardener Fancy e'er could feign, 
 
 Who breeding flowers, will never breed the same: 
 And there shall be for thee all soft delight 
 
 That shadowy thought can win, 
 A bright torch, and a casement ope at night, 
 
 To let the warm Love in ! 
 
 1. Oh welcome, bat and owlet gray, 
 Thus winging low your airy way ! 
 And welcome, moth and drowsy fly, 
 That to mine ear come humming by ! 
 And welcome, shadows dim and deep, 
 And stars that through the pale sky peep ! 
 O welcome all ! to me ye say, 
 
 My woodland Love is on her way. 
 
 Upon the soft wind floats her hair ; 
 Her breath is in the dewy air ; 
 Her steps are in the whispered sound, 
 That steals along the stilly ground. 
 O dawn of day, in rosy bower, 
 What art thou to this witching hour? 
 O noon of day, in sunshine bright, 
 What art thou to the fall of night ? 
 
 2. Oh Love ! young Love ! bound in thy rosy band, 
 Let sage or cynic prattle as he will, 
 
 These hours, and only these, redeem life's years of 
 ill! 
 
 3. [The Meeting of Hafed and Hinda.] 
 Moments there are, and this was one, 
 Snatch'd like a minute's gleam of sun 
 Amid the black Simoon's eclipse — 
 
 Or like those verdant spots that bloom 
 Around the crater's burning lips, 
 
 Sweetening the very edge of doom ! 
 The past — the future — all that Fate 
 Can bring of dark or desperate 
 Around such hours, but makes them cast 
 Intenser radiance while they last ! 
 
 9. Keats' Ode to Psyche. 1. Joanna Baillie, Song. 
 2. Childe Harold, c. ii. 81. 3. Lalla Rookh. 
 
LOVE. 3OI 
 
 Never was scene so form'd for love ! 
 Beneath them, waves of crystal move, 
 In silent swell — Heav'n glows above, 
 And their pure hearts, to transport given, 
 Swell like the wave, and glow like heav'n ! 
 But oh ! too soon that dream is past — 
 * * * * 
 
 But minutes speed — night gems the skies — 
 
 4. [Tis sweet to think] 
 
 The heart, like a tendril, accustomed to cling, 
 
 Let it grow where it will, cannot flourish alone, 
 But will lean to the nearest and loveliest thing 
 
 It can twine in itself, and make closely its own. 
 
 % * * >:< 
 
 Love's wing and the peacock's are nearly alike, 
 They are both of them bright, but they're change- 
 able too. 
 
 5. [Love's young dream.] 
 
 ;j; & -fc -!< 
 
 On memory's waste. 
 'Twas odour fled 
 As soon as shed ; 
 'Twas morning's winged dream ; 
 'Twas a light that ne'er can shine again 
 On life's dull stream ! 
 
 6. For thy locks of raven-hue, 
 
 Flowers with hoar-frost pearly, 
 Crocus-cups of gold and blue, 
 
 Snowdrops drooping early, 
 With mezereon-sprigs combine : 
 Rise, my love, my Valentine. 
 
 7. Come into the garden, Maud, 
 
 For the black bat, night, has flown, 
 Come into the garden, Maud, 
 
 I am here at the gate alone ; 
 And the woodbine spices are wafted abroad, 
 
 And the musk of the roses blown. 
 
 For a breeze of morning moves, 
 
 And the planet of Love is high, 
 Beginning to faint in the light that she loves 
 
 On a bed of daffodil sky, 
 To faint in the light of the sun she loves, 
 
 To faint in his light and to die. 
 
 4, 5. Irish Melodies. 6. Montgomery, The Valentine 
 Wreath. 7. Tennyson, From 'Maud.' 
 
302 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 There has fallen a splendid tear 
 
 From the passion-flower at the gate. 
 She is coming, my dove, my dear ; 
 
 She is coming, my life, my fate; 
 The red rose cries, ' She is near, she is near; ' 
 
 And the white rose weeps, ' She is late ; ' 
 The larkspur listens, ' I hear, I hear ; ' 
 
 And the lily whispers, ' I wait.' 
 
 She is coming, my own, my sweet; 
 
 Were it ever so airy a tread, 
 My heart would hear her and beat, 
 
 Were it earth in an earthy bed ; 
 My dust would hear her and beat, 
 
 Had I lain for a century dead ; 
 Would start and tremble under her feet, 
 
 And blossom in purple and red. 
 
 8. ' Come down, O maid, from yonder mountain height 
 What pleasure lives in height (the Shepherd sang), 
 In height and cold, the splendour of the hills ? 
 But cease to move so near the Heavens, and cease 
 To glide a sunbeam by the blasted Pine, 
 To sit a star upon the sparkling spire ; 
 And come, for Love is of the valley, come, 
 For Love is of the valley, come thou down 
 And find him ; by the happy threshold, he, 
 Or hand in hand with Plenty in the maize, 
 Or red with spirted purple of the vats, 
 Or fox-like in the vine ; nor cares to walk 
 With Death and Morning on the silver horns, 
 Nor wilt thou snare him in the white ravine, 
 Nor find him dropt upon the firths of ice, 
 That huddling slant in furrow-cloven falls 
 To roll the torrent out of dusky doors : 
 But follow ; let the torrent dance thee down, 
 To find him in the valley ; let the wild 
 Lean-headed eagles yelp alone, and leave 
 The monstrous ledges there to slope, and spill 
 Their thousand wreaths of dangling water-smoke, 
 That like a broken purpose waste in air : 
 So waste not thou, but come, for all the vales 
 Await thee ; azure pillars of the hearth 
 Arise to thee ; the children call, and I 
 Thy shepherd pipe, and sweet is every sound, 
 Sweeter thy voice, but every sound is sweet; 
 
 8. Tennyson, From i The Princess.' 
 
WAVERING LOVE, ETC. 303 
 
 Myriads of rivulets hurrying thro' the lawn, 
 The moan of doves in immemorial elms, 
 And murmuring of innumerable bees.' 
 
 Wavering Love. — 
 
 8. This weak impress of love is as a figure 
 Trenched [cut] in ice, which, with an hour's heat, 
 Dissolves to water, and doth lose his form. 
 
 9. Even as the changeful moon across the sky 
 Moves on inconstant — now in brightness shining, — 
 Now clouded — now towards the hills declining — 
 Now lifts its face, and now its horn on high : 
 
 So falsely midst the gods — so treach'rously 
 Doth love deceive, and laugh at mortal men — 
 
 1. The forest trees now put their foliage on, 
 
 The almond its new flower begins to wear; 
 This genial sun could animate a stone, 
 When all is joyous — why do we despair? 
 
 Voice. — 
 
 2. your tongue's sweet air 
 
 More tuneable than lark to shepherd's ear, 
 
 When wheat is green, when haw-thorn buds appear. 
 
 3. [His voice in thine reflected] 
 
 Like echo, sending back sweet music, fraught 
 With twice th' aerial sweetness it had brought ! 
 
 Retreat. 
 
 4. Ah, for some retreat 
 
 Deep in yonder shining Orient, where my life began to 
 
 beat ; 
 
 * * * . 
 
 Or to burst all links of habit — there to wander far 
 
 away, 
 On from island unto island at the gateways of the day. 
 
 Larger constellations burning, mellow moons and 
 
 happy skies, 
 Breadths of tropic shade and palms in cluster, knots 
 
 of Paradise. 
 
 Never comes the trader, never floats an European flag, 
 Slides the bird o'er lustrous woodland, swings the trailer 
 from the crag; 
 
 8. Two Gentlemen of Verona. 9. Bowring's Cheskian 
 Anthology, Bohemia. 1. Oxenford's French Songs (Ejnile 
 Varin). 2. Midsummer Night's Dream. 3. Lalla Rookh. 
 4. Tennyson's Locksley Hall. 
 
304 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Droops the heavy blossom'd bower, hangs the heavy 
 
 fruited tree — 
 
 * * * 
 
 Forward, forward let us range. 
 
 Let the great world spin for ever down the ringing 
 grooves of change. 
 
 * * * 
 
 Comes a vapour from the margin, blackening over 
 
 heath and holt, 
 Cramming all the blast before it, in its breast a 
 
 thunderbolt. 
 
 Let it fall on Locksley Hall, with rain or hail, or fire 
 
 or snow ; 
 For the mighty wind arises, roaring seaward, and I go. 
 
 Fairy Feast. — 
 
 5. A little mushroom table spread ; 
 
 After short prayers, they set on bread, 
 A moon-parch'd grain of purest wheat, 
 With some small glittering grit, to eat 
 His choicest bits with ; then in a trice 
 They make a feast less great than nice. 
 But, all this while his eye is serv'd, 
 We must not think his ear is starv'd ; 
 But that there was in place, to stir 
 His spleen, the chirring grasshopper, 
 The merry cricket, puling fly, 
 The piping gnat, for minstrelsy ; 
 And now we must imagine first 
 The elves present, to quench his thirst 
 A pure seed-pearl of infant dew, 
 Brought and besweeten'd in a blue 
 And pregnant violet ; which done, 
 His kitling eyes begin to run 
 Quite through the table, where he spies 
 The horns of papery butterflies, 
 Of which he eats ; and tastes a little 
 Of what we call the cuckoo's spittle : 
 A little furze-ball pudding stands 
 By, yet not blessed by his hands, 
 That was too coarse ; but then forthwith 
 . He ventures boldly on the pith 
 Of sugar'd rush, and eats the sag 
 And well-bestrutted bee's sweet bag; 
 Gladding his palate with some store 
 Of emmet's eggs ; what would he more, 
 
 5. Herrick's Oberon's Feast. 
 
WINE, ETC. 305 
 
 But beards of mice, a newt's stew'd thigh, 
 
 A bloated earwig, and a fly ; 
 
 With the red-capp'd worm, that is shut 
 
 Within the concave of a nut, 
 
 Brown as a tooth ; a little moth, 
 
 Late fatten'd in a piece of cloth ; 
 
 With wither'd cherries ; mandrake's ears ; 
 
 Moles' eyes ; to these, the slain stag's tears; 
 
 The unctuous dewlaps of a snail ; 
 
 The broke heart of a nightingale 
 
 O'ercome in music ; with a wine 
 
 Ne'er ravish'd from the flattering vine, 
 
 But gently press'd from the soft side 
 
 Of the most sweet and dainty bride, 
 
 Brought in a dainty daisy, which 
 
 He fully quaffs up to bewitch 
 
 His blood to height ? This done commended 
 
 Grace by the priest, the feast is ended. 
 
 Wine. — 
 
 6. Wine's the sun ; the moon, sweet soul ! 
 We will call the waning bowl : 
 
 Bring the sun, bring him soon, 
 To the bosom of the moon ! 
 
 Dash us with this liquid fire, 
 It will thoughts divine inspire ; 
 And, by nature taught to glow, 
 Let it like the waters flow. 
 
 7. Fly not yet, 'tis just the hour 
 
 When pleasure, like the midnight flow'r,* 
 That scorns the eye of vulgar light, 
 Begins to bloom for sons of night. 
 
 Marriage. — 
 
 8. Roses, their sharp spines being gone, 
 Not royal in their smells alone, 
 
 But in their hue ; 
 Maiden pinks, of odour faint, 
 Daisies smell-less, yet most quaint, 
 
 And sweet tyme true ; 
 
 Primrose, first-born child of Ver, 
 Merry spring-time's harbinger, 
 
 6. S. Rousseau's Persian Literature. 7. Irish Melodies. 
 8. Beaumont and Fletcher, Bridal Song. 
 
 * Termed by Linnaeus, flores tristes, melancholy flowers. 
 
 X 
 
3° 6 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 With her bells dim ; 
 Oxlips in their cradles growing, 
 Marigolds on death-beds blowing, 
 
 Lark-heels trim ; 
 All, dear Nature's children sweet, 
 Lie 'fore bride and bridegroom's feet, 
 
 Blessing their sense ! 
 Not an angel of the air, 
 Bird melodious or bird fair, 
 
 Be absent hence ! 
 
 The crow, the slanderous cuckoo, nor 
 The boding raven, nor chough hoar, 
 
 Nor chattering pie, 
 May on our bridehouse perch or sing, 
 Or with them any discord bring, 
 
 But from it fly ! , 
 
 Calm. — 
 
 9. Calm as a frozen lake when ruthless winds 
 Blow fiercely, agitating earth and sky, 
 The mother now remained ; 
 
 Friendship. — 
 
 1. Devouring Time, blunt thou the lion's paws, 
 And make the earth devour her own sweet brood ; 
 Pluck the keen teeth from the fierce tiger's jaws, 
 And burn the long-lived phcenix in her blood ; 
 Make glad and sorrow seasons, as thou fleet'st, 
 And do whate'er thou wilt, swift-footed Time, 
 To the wide world, and all her fading sweets ; 
 But I forbid thee one most heinous crime ; 
 
 O carve not with thy hours my friend's high brow, 
 Nor draw no lines there with thine antique pen ; 
 Him in thy course untainted do allow, 
 For beauty's pattern to succeeding men. 
 
 Yet, do thy worst, old Time : despite thy wrong, 
 My friend shall in my verse ever live young. 
 
 2. this pray'r shall be mine : 
 
 That the sunshine of love may illumine our youth, 
 
 And the moonlight of friendship console our decline. 
 
 Grief. — 
 
 3. Here let me sit in sorrow for mankind, 
 Like yon neglected shrub at random cast, 
 That shades the steep, and sighs at every blast. 
 
 9. The Excursion. 1. Shakspeare's Sonnets. 2. Irish 
 Melodies. 3. Goldsmith's Traveller. 
 
GRIEF, ETC. 307 
 
 4. As a beam o'er the face of the waters may glow, 
 While the tide runs in darkness and coldness below, 
 So the cheek may be ting'd with a warm sunnj' smile, 
 Though the cold heart to ruin runs darkly the while. 
 
 Oh ! this thought in the midst of enjoyment will stay, 
 Like a dead, leafless branch in the summer's bright ray ; 
 The beams of the warm sun play round it in vain, 
 It may smile in his light, but it blooms not again. 
 
 k. this soft warm heart 
 
 Be left more desolate, more dreary cold 
 Than a forsaken bird's nest filled with snow 
 'Mid its own bush of leafless eglantine — 
 
 Rest. — 
 
 6. Soften'd he sunk upon a couch, and gave 
 
 His soul up to sweet thoughts, like wave on wave 
 Succeeding in smooth seas, when storms are laid. 
 
 Sleep. — 
 
 7. O magic sleep ! O comfortable bird, 
 
 That broodest o'er the troubled sea of the mind 
 Till it is hush'd and smooth ! O unconfined 
 Restraint ! imprison'd liberty ! great key 
 To golden palaces, strange minstrelsy, 
 Fountains grotesque, new trees, bespangled caves, 
 Echoing grottoes, full of tumbling waves 
 And moonlight ; ay, to all the mazy world 
 Of silvery enchantment ! 
 
 8. 1. When restless on my bed I lie, 
 
 Still courting sleep, which still will fly, 
 Then shall reflection's brighter power 
 Illume the lone and midnight hour. 
 
 2. If hush'd the breeze, and calm the tide, 
 Soft will the stream of memory glide, 
 And all the past, a gentle train, 
 Waked by remembrance, live again. 
 
 * • # * 
 
 5. If loud the wind, the tempest high, 
 And darkness wraps the sullen sky, 
 I muse on life's tempestuous sea, 
 And sigh, O Lord, to come to Thee. 
 
 4. Irish Melodies. 5. Wordsworth's Poems. 6. Lalla 
 Rookh. 7. Keats' Endymion, B. i. 8. Noel, Night. 
 
 X 2 
 
3 o8 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 g. Waken, drowsy slumberer, waken! 
 
 Over gorse, green broom, and braken, 
 From her sieve of silken blue, 
 Dawning sifts her silver dew, 
 Hangs the emerald on the willow, 
 Lights her lamp below the billow, 
 Bends the briar and branchy braken — 
 Waken drowsy slumber, waken ! 
 
 Round and round from glen and grove, 
 Pour a thousand hymns of love ; 
 Harps the rail amid the clover, 
 O'er the moor-fern whews the plover, 
 Bat has hid and heath-cock crow'd, 
 Courser neigh'd and cattle low'd, 
 Kid and lamb the lair forsaken — 
 Waken, drowsy slumberer, waken ! 
 
 Metaphysical. 
 Soul.— 
 
 i. Set where the upper streams of Simois flow 
 Was the Palladium, high 'mid rock and wood ; 
 
 So, in lovely moonlight, lives the soul, 
 Mountains surround it, and sweet virgin air ; 
 Cold plashing, past it, crystal waters roll ; 
 We visit it by moments, ah ! too rare. 
 
 2. (Callicles says) ; 
 
 As the sky-brightening south wind clears the day, 
 And makes the mass'd clouds roll ; 
 The music of the lyre blows away 
 The clouds that wrap the soul. 
 
 3. (Empedocks, after a Jong silence, breaks forth). 
 Oh that I could glow like this mountain ! 
 
 Oh that my heart bounded with the swell of the sea ! 
 Oh that my soul were full of light as the stars ! 
 Oh that it brooded over the world like the air ! 
 Nature. — 
 
 4. Like us, the lightning fires 
 
 Love to have scope and play ; 
 The stream, like us, desires 
 An unimpeded way ; 
 Like us, the Libyan wind delights to roam at large. 
 
 9. Hogg's Morning Song to the Shepherd. 1 M. Arnold's 
 New Poems, Palladium. 2, 3. Ibid., Empedocles on Etna. 
 4. Ibid., Callicles'' Song. 
 
MIND, ETC. 309 
 
 Streams will not curb their pride 
 
 The just man not to entomb, 
 Nor lightnings go aside 
 To leave his virtues room ; 
 Nor is that wind less rough which blows a good man's 
 barge ; 
 
 Nature, with equal mind, 
 
 Sees all her sons at play ; 
 Sees man controul the wind, 
 
 The wind sweep man away : 
 Allows the proudly-riding and the founder'd bark. 
 
 Mind. — 
 
 1. The beings of the mind are not of clay ; 
 
 Essentially immortal, they create 
 And multiply in us a brighter ray 
 And more beloved existence : 
 
 2. The everlasting universe of things 
 
 Flows through the mind, and rolls its rapid waves, 
 
 Now dark — now glittering — now reflecting gloom — 
 
 Now lending splendour, where from secret springs 
 
 The source of human thought its tribute brings 
 
 Of waters, — with a sound but half its own, 
 
 Such as a feeble brook will oft assume 
 
 In the wild woods, among the mountains lone, 
 
 Where waterfalls around it leap for ever, 
 
 Where woods and winds contend, and a vast river 
 
 Over its rocks ceaselessly bursts and raves. 
 
 Apathy. — 
 
 3. Many awake, are fast asleep, like the statue, with 
 
 eyes open. 
 
 Fancy. — 
 
 4. When young-eyed Spring profusely throws 
 From her green lap the pink and rose, 
 When the soft turtle of the dale 
 
 To Summer tells her tender tale ; 
 When Autumn cooling caverns seeks, 
 And stains with wine his jolly cheeks | 
 When Winter, like poor pilgrim old, 
 Shakes his silver beard with cold ; 
 At every season let my ear 
 Thy solemn whispers, Fancy, hear. 
 
 1. Byron's Childe Harold, c. iv. 5. 2. Shelley's Mont 
 Blanc. 3. Raverty's Afghan Poetry. 4. Dr. Warton's Ode 
 to Fancy. 
 
3 I O NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 With native beauties win applause 
 Beyond cold critics' studied laws ; 
 O let each Muse's fame increase, 
 O bid Britannia rival Greece. 
 
 5. At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth, 
 Like to bubbles when rain pelteth; 
 * * * 
 
 And the enjoying of the Spring 
 Fades as does its blossoming : 
 Autumn's red-lipp'd fruitage too 
 Blushing through the mist and dew, 
 Cloys with tasting : * * * 
 Fancy, high-commission'd : — send her ! 
 She has vassals to attend her ; 
 She will bring, in spite of frost, 
 Beauties that the earth hath lost ; 
 
 Sweet birds antheming the morn 
 *• # * 
 
 the early April lark, 
 
 Or the rooks, with busy caw, 
 
 The daisy and the marigold ; 
 
 White plumed lilies, and the first 
 
 Hedge-grown primrose that hath burst ; 
 
 Shaded hyacinth, alway 
 
 Sapphire queen of the mid-May: 
 
 And every leaf and every flower 
 
 Pearled with the self-same shower. 
 * * #- 
 
 Freckled nest-eggs thou shalt see 
 Hatching in the hawthorn-tree, 
 
 ■J> ;•; -X. 
 
 — Let the winged Fancy roam, 
 Pleasure never is at home. 
 Musing. — 
 
 6. To sit on rocks, to muse o'er flood and fell, 
 To slowly trace the forest's shady scene, 
 
 This is not solitude; 'tis but to hold 
 Converse with Nature's charms, and view her stores 
 unroll'd. 
 
 7. Oh Thou, who plumed with strong desire 
 
 Wouldst float above the earth, beware! 
 
 5. Keats, Fancy. 6. Childe Harold, c. ii. 25. 7. Shelley, 
 The Two Spirits. 
 
MEMORY, ETC. 3 I I 
 
 A Shadow tracks thy flight of fire — 
 Night is coming ! 
 
 Bright are the regions of the air, 
 
 And among the winds and beams 
 It were delight to wander there — 
 Night is coming ! 
 
 Memory. — 
 
 8. There's a bower of Roses by Bendemeer's stream, 
 
 And the nightingale sings round it all the day long ; 
 In the time of my childhood 'twas like a sweet dream, 
 
 To sit in the roses and hear the bird's song. 
 That bower and its music I never forget, 
 
 But oft when alone, in the bloom of the year, 
 I think — is the nightingale singing there yet ? 
 
 Are the roses still bright by the calm Bendemeer ? 
 
 No, the roses soon wither'd that hung o'er the wave, 
 
 And some blossoms were gather'd while freshly 
 they shone, 
 And a dew was distill'd from their flowers, that gave 
 
 All the fragrance of Summer, when Summer was 
 gone : 
 Thus Memory draws from delight, ere it dies, 
 
 An essence that breathes of it many a year ; 
 Thus bright to my soul, as 'twas then to my eyes, 
 
 Is that bower on the banks ofthe calm Bendemeer ! 
 
 9. spite of comorant devouring Time, 
 
 10. Time but the impression deeper makes 
 As streams their channels deeper wear. 
 
 Literary. 
 The Poet. — 
 
 1. Like the flies, every worthless creature buzzeth about 
 
 him, 
 When sugar-lipped Hamid reciteth his sweet strains. 
 
 2. Thou hast composed thy Gazel, and strung thy pearls 
 
 — come, sing them sweetly, O Hafiz ! 
 For, Heaven has sprinkled over thy poetry the clear- 
 ness and beauty of the Pleiades. 
 
 3. Our poesy is as a gum, which oozes 
 
 From whence 'tis nourished : The fire i' the flint 
 
 8. Moore, Lalla Rookh. 9. Love's Labour Lost. 10. 
 Burns, To Mary in Heaven. 1. Raverty's Afghan Poetry. 
 2. S. Rousseau's Persian Literature. 3. Timon of Athens. 
 
3 I 2 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Shows not, 'till it be struck ; our gentle flame 
 Provokes itself, and like a current flies 
 
 Each bound it chases. 
 
 * * * # 
 
 [No hindrance to the design] in the course I hold ; 
 But flies an eagle's flight, bold, and forth on, 
 Leaving no track behind. 
 
 4. Cameleons feed on light and air : 
 
 Poets' food is love and fame : 
 If in this wide world of care 
 
 Poets could but find the same 
 With as little toil as they, 
 
 Would they ever change their hue 
 
 As the light cameleons do, 
 Suiting it to every ray 
 Twenty times a day ? 
 
 * -•{■ * * 
 
 5. — The Poets, in their elegies and songs 
 Lamenting the departed, call the groves, 
 They call upon the hills and streams to mourn, 
 And senseless rocks ; nor idly ; for they speak, 
 In these their invocations, with a voice 
 Obedient to the strong creative power 
 
 Of human passion. 
 
 6. Thy soul was like a Star, and dwelt apart : 
 
 Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea ; 
 Pure as the naked heaven/; majestic and free. 
 
 7. And the Poet, faithful and far-seeing, 
 
 Sees, alike in stars and flowers, a part 
 Of the self-same universal being, 
 
 Which is throbbing in his brain and heart. 
 
 8. Harp of the North, farewell ! The hills grow dark. 
 
 On purple peaks a deeper shade descending ; 
 In twilight copse the glow-worm lights her spark, 
 
 The deer, half-seen, are to the covert wending. 
 Resume thy wizard elm ! the fountain lending, 
 
 And the wild breeze, thy wilder minstrelsy : 
 Thy numbers sweet with nature's vespers blending, 
 
 With distant echo from the fold and lea, 
 And herd-boy's evening pipe, and hum of housing bee. 
 
 4. Shelley, A n Exhortation. 5. The Excursion. 6. Ibid., 
 Milton. 7. H. W. Longfellow, Flowers. 8. Scott's Lady 
 of the Jjdkc, c. vi. 
 
WORDS, ETC. 313 
 
 Words. — 
 
 9. Words are but flowers, the blossoms of a day, 
 Their worth must vanish, and their grace decay. 
 
 Romance. — 
 
 1. 
 1. When the breeze of a joyful dawn blew free 
 In the silken sail of infancy, 
 The tide of time flowed back with me, 
 
 The forward-flowing tide of time ; 
 And many a sheeny summer-morn, 
 Adown the Tigris I was borne, 
 By Bagdat's shrines of fretted gold, 
 High-walled gardens green and old ; 
 
 11. 
 Anight my shallop, rustling through 
 The low and bloomed foliage, drove 
 The fragrant, glistening deeps, and clove 
 The citron-shadows in the blue : 
 By garden porches on the brim, 
 
 in. 
 
 where all 
 
 The sloping of the moon-lit sward 
 Was damask-work, and deep inlay 
 Of braided blooms unmown, which crept 
 Adown to where the waters slept. 
 
 IV. 
 
 A motion from the river won 
 Ridged the smooth level, bearing on 
 My shallop through the star-strown calm, 
 Until another night in night 
 I entered, from the clear light, 
 Imbowered vaults of pillared palm, 
 Imprisoning sweets, which, as they clomb 
 Heavenward, were stayed beneath the dome 
 Of hollow boughs. 
 
 9. Bagot's Horace's Art of Poetry. I. Tennyson's 
 Recollections of the Arabian Nights. 
 
314 NATURE-STUDY, 
 
 v. 
 Still onward ; and the clear canal 
 Is rounded to as clear a lake. 
 From the green rivage many a fall 
 Of diamond rillets musical, 
 Through little crystal arches low, 
 Down from the central fountain flow, 
 Fallen silver-chiming, seemed to shake 
 The sparkling flints 
 
 VI. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 VII. 
 
 Far off, and where the lemon-grove 
 In closest coverture upsprung, 
 The living airs of middle night 
 Died round the bulbul as he sung; 
 Not he : but something which possessed 
 The darkness of the world, delight, 
 Life, anguish, death, immortal love, 
 Ceasing not, mingled, unrepressed. 
 
 Indian Legends. — 
 
 2. legends and traditions, 
 
 With the odours of the forest, 
 With the dew and damp of meadows, 
 With the curling smoke of wigwams, 
 With the rushing of great rivers, 
 * # * 
 
 (Answer) 
 * From the forests of the prairies, 
 From the great lakes of the Northland, 
 From the land of the Ojibways, 
 From the land of the Dacotahs, 
 From the mountains, moors, and fenlands, 
 Where the heron, the Shuh-shuh-gah, 
 Feeds among the reeds and rushes. 
 
 In the green and silent valley, 
 
 By the pleasant water-courses, 
 * * * 
 
 beyond them stood the forest, 
 
 Stood the groves of singing pine-trees, 
 Green in Summer, white in Winter, 
 Ever sighing, ever singing. 
 
 2. H. W. Longfellow, The Song of Hiawatha, 
 
DIVINE LOVE. 315 
 
 Ye who love the haunts of Nature, 
 Love the sunshine of the meadow, 
 Love the shadow of the forest, 
 Love the wind among the branches, 
 And the rain-shower and the snow-storm, 
 And the rushing of great rivers 
 Through the palisades of pine trees, 
 And the thunder in the mountains, 
 Whose innumerable echoes 
 Flap like eagles in their eyries ; — 
 Listen 
 
 Religious and Moral. 
 
 Divine Love. — 
 
 1. My beloved spake, and said unto me, Rise up, my 
 
 love, my fair one, and come away. (10.) 
 
 For lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone ; 
 
 The flowers appear on the earth ; the time of the 
 singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle 
 is heard in our land ; 
 
 The fig-tree putteth forth her green figs, and the 
 vines with the tender grape give a good smell. 
 Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away. (13.) 
 
 2. All thy garments smell of myrrh, and aloes, and 
 
 cassia, out of the ivory palaces, whereby they 
 have made thee glad. 
 
 3. What matter, though thy countenance is hidden by 
 
 thy curls ? 
 
 The water of immortality itself is, in total darkness, 
 concealed. 
 
 From thy curls, thy ruby lips, and thy face, are pro- 
 duced 
 
 The night, the glow of sunset, and the dawn of day. 
 
 4. Her eyes are lotuses, and the pupils, they are black 
 
 bees ; 
 
 And their gaze, like the gazelle's, is free and unre- 
 strained. 
 
 Her eye-brows are bows, and her eyelashes, the 
 arrows ; 
 
 And to launch upon her lover, she hath raised them. 
 
 1. The Song of Solomon, c. ii. 2. Psalm xlv. 8. 3, 4. 
 Raverty's Afghan Poetry. 
 
3 i6 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 The Creator's Power. — 
 
 5. The spacious firmament on high, 
 With all the blue etherial sky, 
 
 And spangled heavens, a shining frame, 
 
 Their great Original proclaim : 
 
 The unwearied sun, from day to day, 
 
 Does his Creator's power display, 
 
 And publishes to every land, 
 
 The work of an Almighty hand. 
 
 Soon as the evening shades prevail, 
 The moon takes up the wonderous tale, 
 And, nightly, to the listening earth 
 Repeats the story of her birth : 
 Whilst all the stars that round her burn, 
 And all the planets in their turn, 
 Confirm the tidings as they roll, 
 And spread the truth from pole to pole. 
 
 What though, in solemn silence, all 
 Move round the dark terrestrial ball ? 
 What though nor real voice nor sound, 
 Amid their radiant orbs be found ! 
 In reason's ear they all rejoice, 
 And utter forth a glorious voice ; 
 For ever singing as they shine, 
 ' The hand that made us is Divine ! ' 
 
 Mercy. — 
 
 6. For as the heaven is high above the earth, so 
 
 is his mercy towards them that fear him. (11.) 
 
 As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he 
 removed our transgressions from us. (12.) 
 
 7. As the mountains are round about Jerusalem, so the 
 
 Lord is round about his people from henceforth, 
 even for evermore. 
 The Wise. — 
 
 8. The truly wise man practises humility, 
 
 The bough full of fruit, place its head upon the 
 earth. 
 
 9. Empty yet and green, that corn-ear tosses high its 
 
 lofty brow ; 
 See it ripe and full and golden, bend in meek sub- 
 mission now. 
 
 5. A. Marvell's Hymn ; From Addison's Spectator, No. 
 465. 6. Psalm ciii. 7. Psalm cxxv. 2. 8. Rousseau's 
 Persian Literature. Sandee's Book of Advice. 9. Bow- 
 ring's Magyar Poems, (F. Verseghi.) 
 
SELF-EVIDENT, ETC. 317 
 
 Such is boyhood in its folly-— shallow, proud, and 
 
 insolent ; 
 Such is manhood in its wisdom — modest, and in 
 
 calmness bent. 
 
 Self-Evident. — 
 
 1. Doth the wild ass bray when he hath grass ? or 
 
 loweth the ox over his fodder? (5.) 
 
 Can that which is unsavory be eaten without salt? 
 or is there any taste in the white of an egg ? (6.) 
 
 * -i' * * 
 
 Is my strength the strength of stones ? or is my 
 flesh of brass ? 
 
 * (12.) 
 
 Deceitful. — 
 
 2. My brethren have dealt deceitfully as a brook, 
 
 and as the stream of brooks they pass away ; (15.) 
 
 Which are blackish by reason of the ice, and 
 wherein the snow is hid. C 1 ^.) 
 
 Carnal Heart. — 
 
 3. And my black hair hath turned silvery, but my heart 
 
 not the least white. 
 
 Time. — 
 
 4. The heavens on high perpetually do move ; 
 By minutes meal the hour doth steal away ; 
 
 By hours the days, by days the months remove, 
 And then by months the years as fast decay ; 
 Yea, Virgil's verse and Tully's truth do say, 
 That time flieth, and never claps her wings ; 
 But rides on clouds, and forward still she flings. 
 
 5. Time by moments steals away, 
 First the hour, and then the day; 
 Small the daily loss appears, 
 Yet it soon amounts to years : 
 Thus another year is flown, 
 
 And is now no more our own, 
 (Though it brought or promised good,) 
 Than the years before the flood. 
 
 6. Unfathomable Sea ! whose waves are years, 
 
 Ocean of Time, whose waters of deep woe 
 Are brackish with the salt of human tears ! 
 
 Thou shoreless flood, which in thy ebb and flow 
 
 1, 2. Job vi. 3. Raverty's Afghan Poems. 4. Gas- 
 coigne's Swiftness of Time. 5. Newton's Betrospect of 
 the Year. 6. Shelley, Time. 
 
3i8 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Claspest the limits of mortality ! 
 And sick of prey, yet howling on for more, 
 Vomitest thy wrecks on its inhospitable shore ; 
 Treacherous in calm, and terrible in storm, 
 
 Who shall put forth on thee, 
 
 Unfathomable Sea ? 
 
 Joy.— 
 
 7. Oh ! the joy of such hearts, like the light of the 
 
 poles, 
 Is a flash amid darkness, too brilliant to stay. 
 Friendship. — 
 
 8. Then let it console thee, if Love should not stay, 
 
 That friendship our last happy moments shall 
 crown, 
 Like the shadows of morning Love lessens away, 
 While friendship, like those of the closing day, 
 
 Will linger and lengthen as life's sun goes down. 
 
 Peace. — 
 
 9. When groves by moonlight silence keep, 
 And winds the vexed waves release, 
 And fields are hush'd, and cities sleep : 
 — Lord, is not that the hour of peace ? 
 
 When infancy at evening tries, 
 By turns, to climb each parent's knees, 
 And gazing meets their raptured eyes : 
 — Lord, is not that the hour of peace ? 
 
 In golden pomp, when autumn smiles, 
 And hill and dale, its rich increase, 
 By man's full barns exulting piles ; 
 — Lord, is not that the hour of peace ? 
 
 Hope. — 
 
 1. In the hour of adversity be not without hope ; 
 For crystal rain falls from black clouds. 
 
 2. Hope smiles on the infant's dawn of day : 
 To boyhood she opens her liveliest page ; 
 Gilds the visions of youth with her magic ray, 
 Nor is buried at length in the grave of age ; 
 For there when our weary career we close, 
 
 Still Hope is the plant from the tomb that grows. 
 
 7. Moore's Irish Melodies, The Frince's Day, 8. Ibid., 
 Oh yes, when the Bloom. 9. Gisborne, The hour of Peace. 
 1. S. Rousseau's Flowers of Persian Literature. 2. Schiller, 
 Hope, {Translated by Pord Derby.') 
 
DECISION, ETC. 319 
 
 Decision. — 
 
 3. There is a tide in the affairs of men, 
 Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune ; 
 Omitted, all the voyage of their life 
 
 Is bound in shallows, and in miseries. 
 
 On such a full sea are we now afloat ; 
 
 And we must take the current when it serves, 
 
 Or lose our ventures. 
 
 Insensibility. — 
 
 4. In a drear-nighted December 
 Too happy, happy Tree 
 
 Thy branches ne'er remember 
 
 Their green felicity : 
 
 The north cannot undo them 
 
 With a sleety whistle through them, 
 
 Nor frozen thawings glue them 
 
 From budding at the prime. 
 
 In a drear-nighted December 
 Too happy, happy Brook 
 Thy bubblings ne'er remember 
 Apollo's summer look; 
 But with a sweet forgetting 
 They stay their crystal fretting, 
 Never, never petting 
 About the frozen time. 
 
 5. [Azim's false views] 
 
 Of men to gods exalted and refin'd ; 
 
 False views, like that horizon's fair deceit, 
 
 Where earth and heav'n but seem y alas, to meet ! 
 
 Humble. — 
 
 6. The meek and humble, like the oyster, have the pearl 
 
 acquired ; 
 But nought of pearl's merchandize, beareth the 
 caravan of the waves. 
 
 Compassion. — 
 
 7. Thou hast no compassion for my disorder : 
 
 My companion should be afflicted with the same 
 
 malady, 
 That I might sit all day repeating my tale to him ; 
 For two pieces of wood burn together with a brighter 
 
 flame. 
 
 3. Julius Ccesar, Act iv. sc. 3. 4. Keats, Happy Insensi- 
 bility. 5. Lalla Rookh. 6. Raverty's Afghan Poems. 
 7. S. Rousseau's Persian Literature. 
 
3 20 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Promises. — 
 
 8. Speaking, without acting, is mere trouble and 
 
 vexation : 
 The kernel of desire, by this absurdity, cannot be 
 obtained. 
 
 Desires. — 
 
 9. The pearl of our yearnings lieth immersed in ocean's 
 
 depths ; 
 And after it, the divers plunge continually, into its 
 dark abyss. 
 
 1. Chill penury repressed their noble rage, 
 
 And froze the genial current of the soul. 
 
 Obscurity. — 
 
 2. Full many a gem of purest ray serene, 
 
 The dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear ; 
 Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, 
 And waste its sweetness on the desert air. 
 
 The Gay.— 
 
 3. Hence, loathed Melancholy, 
 
 Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight born, 
 In Stygian cave forlorn. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Find some uncouth cell, 
 
 Where brooding Darkness spreads his jealous 
 wings, 
 And the night-raven sings ; 
 
 There, under ebon shades, and low-browed rocks, 
 As ragged as thy locks, 
 
 In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell. 
 
 :;: * * * 
 
 The frolic wind that breathes the spring, 
 Zephyr with Aurora playing, 
 As he met her once a-Maying, 
 There on beds of violets blue, 
 And fresh-blown roses washed in dew, 
 #. * * * 
 
 To hear the lark begin his flight, 
 And singing startle the dull night, 
 From his watch-tower in the skies, 
 Till the dappled dawn doth rise ; 
 
 8, 9. Raverty's Afghan Poetry. 1, 2. Gray's Elegy. 
 3. Milton's V Allegro. 
 
THE GAY, ETC. 32 I 
 
 And at my window bid good morrow, 
 Through the sweet-briar, or the vine, 
 Or the twisted eglantine : 
 While the cock, with lively din, 
 
 Scatters the rear of darkness thin ; 
 
 * * * 
 
 rouse the slumbering Morn, 
 
 From the side of some hoar hill, 
 
 * * . * 
 
 - By hedge-row elms, on hillocks green, 
 Right against the eastern gate, 
 Where the great sun begins his state, 
 Robed in flames, and amber light, 
 The clouds in thousand liveries dight, 
 
 * * * 
 
 Under the hawthorn in the dale, 
 
 * * * 
 
 Russet lawns, and fallows gray, 
 Where the nibbling flocks do stray ; 
 Mountains, on whose barren breast 
 The labouring clouds do 'often rest ; 
 Meadows trim with daisies pied, 
 Shallow brooks, and rivers wide : 
 
 Towers 
 
 Bosomed high in tufted trees, 
 
 * * * 
 
 two aged oaks, 
 
 * * * 
 
 To many a youth, and many a maid, 
 Dancing in the chequered shade ; 
 
 * * * 
 
 On a sunshine holiday, 
 
 Till the livelong daylight fail : 
 
 * * #• 
 
 By whispering winds soon lulled asleep. 
 
 * * * 
 
 Such sights as youthful poets dream 
 On summer eves by haunted stream. 
 
 The Pensive. 
 
 3. Hence, vain deluding Joys, 
 
 The brood of Folly 
 
 As thick and numberless 
 
 As the gay motes that people the sunbeams ; 
 
 3, Milton's 77 Penseroso. 
 
32 2 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Or likest hovering dreams, 
 
 The fickle pensioners of Morpheus' train. 
 
 ;fc * * * 
 
 Oft in glimmering bowers and glades 
 
 in secret shades 
 
 01 woody Ida's inmost grove, 
 
 * * * * 
 
 I walk unseen 
 
 On the dry smooth-shaven green, 
 To behold the wandering moon, 
 Riding near her highest noon, 
 
 led astray 
 
 Through the heavens' wide pathless way ; 
 
 as if her head she bowed, 
 
 Stooping through a fleecy cloud. 
 
 * * * 
 
 Over some wide-watered shore, 
 >:- * * 
 
 Far from all resort of mirth, 
 Save the cricket on the hearth, 
 
 Or bid the soul of Orpheus sing 
 Such notes as, warbled to the string, 
 Drew iron tears down Pluto's cheek, 
 
 ^c ^c if: 
 
 Of forests and enchantments drear, 
 Where more is meant than meets the ear. 
 
 Thus, Night, oft see me in thy pale career, 
 Till civil-suited Morn appear, 
 
 * * * 
 
 in a comely cloud, 
 
 While rocking winds are piping loud, 
 Or ushered with a shower still, 
 When the gust hath blown his fill, 
 Ending on the rustling leaves, 
 With minute drops from off the eaves. 
 
 And, when the sun begins to fling 
 His flaring beams, me, Goddess, bring 
 To arched walks of twilight groves, 
 And shadows brown, that Sylvan loves, 
 Of pine, or monumental oak, 
 
 * * * 
 
 in close covert by some brook, 
 
 * * * 
 
DISSOLUTION. 323 
 
 Hide me from day's garish eye, 
 While the bee with honied thigh, 
 That at her flowery work doth sing, 
 And the waters murmuring, 
 With such consort as they keep, 
 Entice the dewy-feather'd Sleep ; 
 And let some strange mysterious dream 
 Wave at his wings, in airy stream 
 Of lively portraiture displayed, 
 Softly in my eyelids laid. 
 
 Dissolution. — 
 
 4. As the cloud is consumed and vanisheth away : 
 
 so he that goeth down to the grave shall come 
 up no more. 
 
 5. The things of earth are like a river ; — 
 
 A summer river. — swiftly dry ; 
 The things above endure for ever, 
 
 Their ocean is — immensity. 
 There streams of joy which ne'er shall be 
 Exhausted, roll eternally, 
 And thither let our spirits flee. 
 
 6. How little do we know that which we are ! 
 How less what we may be ! The eternal surge 
 Of time and tide rolls on, and bears afar 
 
 Our bubbles ; as the old burst, new emerge, 
 Lashed from the foam of ages, while the graves 
 Of empires heave but like some passing waves. 
 
 7. Poor wand'rers of a stormy day ! 
 
 From wave to wave we're driven, 
 And Fancy's flash, and Reason's ray, 
 Serve but to light the troubled way — 
 
 8. We are as clouds that veil the midnight moon : 
 
 How restlessly they speed, and gleam, and quiver, 
 Streaking the darkness radiantly ! — yet soon 
 Night closes round, and they are lost for ever. 
 
 Man's yesterday may ne'er be like his morrow ; 
 Nought may endure but Mutability. 
 
 9. When the lamp is shattered 
 The light in the dust lies dead — 
 
 When the cloud is scattered, 
 The rainbow's glory is shed. 
 
 4. Job vii. 9. 5. Bowring's Poetry of Spain. 6. Byron, 
 Human Life. 7. Moore's Sacred Songs. 8. Shelley, 
 Mutability. 9. Ibid., Lines. 
 
 Y 2 
 
3^4 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 When the lute is broken, 
 Sweet tones are remembered not ; 
 
 When the lips have spoken, 
 Loved accents are soon forgot. 
 
 Futurity, &c. — 
 
 10. There is a land of pure delight, 
 
 Where saints immortal reign, 
 Infinite day excludes the night, 
 And pleasures banish pain. 
 
 There everlasting spring abides, 
 And never-withering flowers ; 
 Death, like a narrow sea, divides 
 This heavenly land from ours. 
 
 Sweet fields, beyond the swelling flood, 
 Stand dress'd in living green : 
 
 So to the Jews old Canaan stood, 
 While Jordan roll'd between. 
 
 1. The stream, that hath left the sluice, floweth not back 
 
 again. 
 
 The hour, which hath passed away, returneth to us 
 no more ! 
 
 For time is, alas ! like unto the dead in the sepul- 
 chre's niche ; 
 
 And no one hath brought, by weeping, the dead to 
 life again. 
 
 Brevity. — 
 
 2. Who can place any dependence upon this fleeting 
 
 breath ? 
 It is impossible to confine the wind with the strongest 
 chain ! 
 
 Decay. — 
 
 3. Doth the flower always bloom ? Nothing can exist 
 
 for ever ! 
 
 4. The human frame as rapidly decayeth, 
 As the tulips, in the autumn, wither away. 
 
 The Impossible. — 
 
 5. When the rain drops fall from the sky upon the earth. 
 They cannot again ascend unto the heavens whence 
 
 they came. 
 Imagine not, that those tears which the eye sheddeth, 
 Shall e'er again return to the eyes they flowed from. 
 
 10. Watts, Death in Prospect of Heaven. 1 to 5. Raverty's 
 Afghan Poetry. 
 
CHANGE, ETC. 325 
 
 Change. — 
 
 6*. In the same manner as the sun's shadow shifteth, 
 So likewise there is nowhere permanence in this 
 world. 
 
 7*/The friendship of this world's friend is false and 
 hollow. 
 From the tulips thou seekest permanence, unavail- 
 ingly. 
 
 8. The world, verily, is like a running stream, 
 Upon which no impression can remain. 
 
 Illusion. — 
 
 9. Some fleeting good, that mocks me with the view ; 
 That, like the circle bounding earth and skies, 
 Allures from far, yet, as I follow, flies — 
 
 Evanescence. — 
 
 1. our days upon earth are a shadow. 9. 
 
 Can the rush grow up without mire ? can the flag 
 grow without water ? 11. 
 
 Whilst it is yet in his greenness, and not cut down, 
 it withereth before any other herb. 12. 
 
 [Applied to the hypocrite, and those who forget God.] 
 whose trust shall be a spider's web. 13, 14. 
 
 2. (Man.) He cometh forth like a flower, and is cut 
 
 down : he fleeth also as a shadow, and continueth 
 not. 
 
 3. (The wicked hypocrite.) He shall fly away as a dream, 
 
 and shall not be found : yea, he shall be chased 
 away as a vision of the night. 
 
 4. I am forgotten as a dead man out of mind : I am like 
 
 a broken vessel. 
 
 5. As smoke is driven away, so drive them away : as 
 
 wax melteth before the fire, so let the wicked 
 perish at the presence of God. 
 
 6. For he remembered that they were but flesh ; a wind 
 
 that passeth away, and cometh not again. 
 
 7. My days are like a shadow that declineth ; and I am 
 
 withered like grass. 
 
 6*, 7*, 8. Raverty's Afghan Poetry. 9. Goldsmith, The 
 
 Traveller. 1. Job viii. 2. Job xiv. 2. 3. Job xx. 8. 
 
 4. Psalm xxxi. 12. 5. Ps. lxviii. 2. 6. Ps. lxxviii. 39. 
 7. Ps. cii. 11. 
 
326 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 8. As for man, his days are as grass : as a flower of 
 
 the field, so he flourisheth. 15. 
 
 For the wind passeth over it, and it is gone ; and 
 the place thereof shall know it no more. 16. 
 
 9. Man is like to vanity : his days are as a shadow that 
 
 passeth away. 
 
 1. Or e'er some thousand years have past ? and that 
 Is, to eternity compared, a space, 
 
 Briefer than is the twinkling of an eye 
 To the heaven's slowest orb. 
 
 2. ' Say, why across thy visage beam'd, but now, 
 The lightning of a smile !' 
 
 * * * 
 
 * Perchance 
 
 Thou marvel'st at my smiling.' 
 
 3. For not on downy plumes, nor under shade 
 Of canopy reposing, fame is won, 
 Without which whosoe'er consumes his days, 
 Leaveth such vestige of himself on earth, 
 
 As smoke in air or foam upon the wave. 
 
 4. How shall I define what thing I am ? 
 
 * * ■* 
 
 Sometimes a mote in the disc of the sun ; 
 At others, a ripple on the water's surface. 
 
 5. Like the dry leaf that autumn's breath 
 Sweeps from the tree, — the mourning tree : 
 So swiftly and so certainly 
 
 Our days are blown about by death. 
 
 6. For aught that I could ever read, 
 
 Could ever hear by tale or history, 
 
 The course of true love never did run smooth. 
 * * * * 
 
 Or, if there were a sympathy in choice, 
 War, death, or sickness, did lay siege to it ; 
 Making it momentary as a sound, 
 Swift as a shadow, short as a dream ; 
 Brief as the lightning in the collied night, 
 That, in a spleen, unfolds both heaven and earth, 
 And ere a man hath power to say, — Behold ! 
 
 8. Psalm ciii. 9. Ps. cxliv. 4. 1. Cary's Dante {Purga- 
 tory), c. xi. 2. Ibid., c. xxi. 3. Ibid. (Hell), c. xxiv. 
 4. Raverty's Afghan Poetry. 5. Bowring's Poetry of Spain. 
 6. Midsummer Night's Dream, Act i. sc. 1. 
 
EVANESCENCE. 327 
 
 The jaws of darkness do devour it up : 
 So quick Jbright things come to confusion. 
 
 7. Like to the falling of a star, 
 Or as the flights of eagles are ; 
 
 Or like the fresh Spring's gaudy hue, 
 Or silver drops of morning dew ; 
 Or like a wind that chafes the flood, 
 Or bubbles which on water stood : 
 Even such is'man whose borrow'd light 
 Is straight call'd in, and; paid. to-night. 
 
 The wind blows out, the bubble dies ; 
 The spring entomb'd in autumn lies ; 
 The dew dries up, the star is shot : 
 The flight is past — the man forgot. 
 
 8. Let's take the instant by the forward top : 
 For we are old, and on our quick'st decrees 
 The inaudible and noiseless foot of time 
 Steals, ere we can effect them : 
 
 9. Yet time has seen, that lifts the low, 
 And level lays the lofty brow, 
 
 Has seen the broken pile complete, 
 Big with the vanity of state ; 
 But transient is the smile of fate ! 
 A little rule, a little sway, 
 A sunbeam in a winter's day, 
 Is all the proud and mighty have 
 Between the cradle and the grave. 
 
 10. [Daffodils'] 
 
 We have short time to stay, as you, 
 
 We have as short a Spring ; 
 As quick a growth to meet decay 
 As you, or anything. 
 We die, 
 As your hours do, and dry 
 
 Away, 
 Like to the Summer's rain ; 
 Or as the pearls of Morning's dew 
 Ne'er to be found again. 
 
 1. As bees flee hame wi' lades o' treasure, 
 
 The minutes wing'd their way wi' pleasure : 
 
 7. Dr. H. King, Sic Vita. 8. All's well that ends well, 
 Act v. sc. 3. 9. Dyer's Grongar Hill. 10. Herrick, To 
 Daffodils. 1. Burns' Tarn 0' Shanter. 
 
328 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 * * * 
 
 But pleasures are like poppies spread, 
 
 You seize the flower, its bloom is shed ! 
 
 Or like the snowfall in the river, 
 
 A moment white — then melts for ever ;* 
 
 Or like the borealis race, 
 
 That flit ere you can point their place ; 
 
 Or like the rainbow's lovely form, 
 
 Evanishing amid the storm. 
 
 Nae man can tether time or tide. 
 
 2. Ah ! not in vain we silver rills 
 
 From mossy fountains flow : 
 Who brawling down the vocal hills, 
 Leave mortals as we go. 
 
 Pictur'd in us, may mortals see, 
 
 In our incessant strife, 
 The toils of drear obscurity, 
 
 The toils of mortal life. 
 
 Fast, fast we run, ne'er to return, 
 
 Like time that ever flies ; 
 Thy fate with us, O man ! then mourn, 
 
 And mourning be thou wise. 
 
 Thro' fretting on our course we gain, 
 
 Like poor contentious pride, 
 Yet all our toil is not in vain, 
 
 We swell the river's tide. 
 
 From us, lone travelers of the dale, 
 
 O be it understood, 
 Now e'en the lowliest in life's vale 
 
 May aid the common good. 
 
 3. The day retires 
 
 * * * * 
 
 The stars awake in heaven's abyss of blue ; 
 
 * # * . * 
 
 Even as a sand in the majestic sea, 
 
 A diamond-atom on a hill of snow, 
 
 A spark amidst a Hecla's majesty, 
 
 An unseen mote where maddened whirlwinds blow, 
 
 Am I midst scenes like these — the mighty thought 
 
 O'erwhelms me — I am nought, or less than nought. 
 
 2. Bidlake, Inscription on a Rill. 3. Bowring's Russian 
 Poets (Lomonossov). 
 
 * See Chapter ii. page 42 ; these two lines misquoted by 
 S. T. Coleridge. 
 
EVANESCENCE. 329 
 
 The pale, the cold, and the moony smile 
 Which the meteor beam of a starless night 
 
 Sheds on a lonely sea-girt isle, 
 
 Ere the dawning of morn's undoubted light, 
 
 Is the flame of life so fickle and wan 
 
 That flits round our steps till their strength is gone. 
 
 Swift as the arrow cuts its way, 
 
 Through the soft-yielding air ; 
 Or as the sun's more subtle ray, 
 
 Or lightning's sudden glare ; 
 Or as an eagle to the prey, 
 
 Or shuttle through the loom, — 
 So haste our fleeting lives away, 
 
 So pass we to the tomb. 
 
 Like airy bubbles, lo ! we rise, 
 
 And dance upon life's stream ; 
 Till soon the air that caused, destroys 
 
 Th' attenuated frame. 
 Down the swift stream we glide apace, 
 
 And carry death within ; 
 Then break, and scarcely leave a trace, 
 
 To show that we have been. 
 
 Like as the damask rose you see, 
 Or like the blossom on the tree, 
 Or like the dainty flower in May, 
 Or like the morning of the day, 
 Or like the sun, or like the shade, 
 Or like the gourd which Jonas had — 
 E'en such is man ; whose thread is spun 
 Drawn out, and cut, and so is done. 
 The rose withers ; * * 
 
 ^ T^ ^ >j< 
 
 Like to the grass that's newly sprung, 
 
 Or like a tale that's new begun, 
 
 Or like the bird that's here to day, 
 
 Or like the pearled dew of May, 
 
 Or like an hour, or like a span, 
 
 Or like the singing of a swan — 
 
 E'en such is man ; who lives by breath, 
 
 Is here, now there, in life, and death. 
 
 4. Shelley, On Death. 5. Clarke, The Brevity of Life. 
 6. S. Wastell, Man's Mortality. 
 
33° NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Departed.— 
 
 7. He is gone to the mountain 
 
 He is lost to the forest, 
 Like a summer-dried fountain, 
 
 When our need was the sorest. 
 The fount reappearing 
 
 From the raindrops shall borrow, 
 But to us comes no cheering, 
 To Duncan no morrow ! 
 
 The autumn winds rushing 
 
 Waft the leaves that are searest, 
 
 But our flower was in flushing 
 When blighting was nearest. 
 
 Like the dew on the mountain, 
 
 Like the foam on the river, 
 Like the bubble on the fountain, 
 
 Thou art gone, and for ever ! 
 
 8. The tenor 
 
 Which my life holds, he readily may conceive 
 Whoe'er hath stood to watch a mountain brook 
 In some still passage of its course, and seen, 
 Within the depths of its capacious breast, 
 Inverted trees, and rocks, and azure sky ; 
 And, on its glassy surface, specks of foam, 
 And conglobated bubbles undissolved, 
 Numerous as stars; that, by their onward lapse, 
 Betray to sight the motion of the stream, 
 Else imperceptible. Meanwhile, is heard 
 Perchance a roar or murmur; and the sound 
 Though soothing, and the little floating isles 
 Though beautiful, are both by Nature charged 
 With the same pensive office ; and make known 
 Through what perplexing labyrinths, abrupt 
 Precipitous, and untoward straits, 
 The earth-born wanderer hath passed ; and quickly, 
 That respite o'er, like traverses and toils 
 Must be again encountered. — Such a stream 
 Is human Life. 
 
 9. See how, beneath the moonbeam's smile, 
 Yon little billow heaves its breast, 
 And foams and sparkles for awhile, 
 And murmuring then subsides to rest. 
 
 7. Scott, Coronach. 8. Wordsworth, The Excursion. 
 9. Moore, A Reflection at Sea. 
 
war. 3 3 1 
 
 The man, the sport of bliss and care, 
 
 Rises on Time's eventful sea ; 
 And, having swell'd a moment there, 
 
 Thus melts into eternity ! 
 
 Political. 
 War.— 
 
 i. Her vine, the merry cheerer of the heart, 
 Unpruned dies ; her hedges even-pleached, 
 Like prisoners wildly overgrown with hair, 
 Put forth disorder'd twigs : her fallow leas 
 The darnel, hemlock, and rank fumitory, 
 Doth root upon ; while that the coulter rusts, 
 That should deracinate such savag'ry : 
 The even mead, that erst brought sweetly forth 
 The freckled cowslip, burnet, and green clover, 
 Wanting the scythe, all uncorrected, rank, 
 Conceives by idleness ; and nothing teems, 
 But hateful docks, rough thistles, kecksies, burs, 
 Losing both beauty and utility. 
 And as our vineyards, fallows, meads, and hedges, 
 Defective in their natures, grow to wildness. 
 
 2. On Linden, when the sun was low, 
 
 All bloodless lay th' untrodden snow ; 
 And dark as winter was the flow 
 Of Iser rolling rapidly. 
 
 But Linden saw another sight, 
 When the drum beat at dead of night, 
 Commanding fires of death to light 
 The darkness of her scenery. 
 
 h« * * * 
 
 And furious every charger neigh'd, 
 To join the dreadful revelry. 
 
 Then shook the hills with thunder riven, 
 Then rush'd the steed, to battle driven, 
 And louder than the bolts of Heaven, 
 Far flash'd the red artillery. 
 
 But redder yet that light shall glow 
 On Linden's hills of stained snow, 
 And bloodier yet the torrent flow 
 Of Iser, rolling rapidly. 
 
 i. King Henry V., Act v. sc. 2. 2. Campbell's 
 
 Hohenlinden. 
 
33 1 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Treachery. — 
 
 3. When ivy twines around a tree, 
 
 And o'er the boughs hangs verdantly, 
 Or on the bark, however rough, 
 It seems indeed polite enough ; 
 And (judging from external things) 
 We deem it there in friendship clings ; 
 But where our weak and mortal eyes 
 Attain not — hidden treachery lies : 
 'Tis there it brings decay unseen, 
 While all without seems bright and green ; 
 So that the tree which flourished fair, 
 Before its time grows old and bare ; 
 Then, like a barren log of wood, 
 It stands in lifeless solitude, 
 For treachery drags it to its doom, 
 Which gives but blight — yet promised bloom. 
 
 We have arranged the foregoing specimens 
 under the heads of — Universe Physical, Social, 
 Metaphysical, Literary, Religious, Moral, and 
 Political. Of these the subject that offers most 
 material is the Universe ; next the Social por- 
 tion ; and third, the Religious and Moral. But 
 of these not the greatest subjects are the most in 
 demand, on the contrary it may surprise many 
 to find that from a given class of poets their 
 topics are the beautiful in preference to the 
 sublime, and that the small and evanescent in 
 Nature excites almost more exquisite attention 
 than matter of real magnitude. For example, it 
 is not a little remarkable that most poets, with 
 varying success speak of breath, air, mist, smoke, 
 spark, flash, bubbles, dew, drop, snow, and other 
 equally weak, feeble, transient, natural objects 
 and appearances As : — 
 
 3. Bowring's Batavian Anthology : Dutch Poets (Jacob 
 Cats). 
 
EVANESCENCE. 333 
 
 A dream, a breath, a froth of fleeting joy. 
 
 or ' melted ' — 
 
 As breath into the wind. 
 
 or — 
 
 or- 
 
 -like the snowfall in the river, 
 
 A moment white — then lost for ever. 
 
 At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth 
 Like to bubbles when rain pelteth. 
 
 In our next division of specimens we shall 
 bring our selections to a close, taking a view of 
 the Negative and non-natural side of the subject 
 of Nature-Study. 
 
( 334 ) 
 
 Chapter X. 
 
 On Negative views of Nature ; contra-natural and fabulous 
 creatures ; poetical mysticism ; Nature as a standard of 
 
 - taste and criticism ; In Memoriam ; Nature and Art ; 
 illustrative poetical specimens of the negative employ- 
 ment of Nature ; remarks on the application of the term 
 negative ; when misused ; its various employment ; 
 Nature-Study still requisite. 
 
 Having presented a series of examples derived 
 from various poetical sources, arranged under 
 distinctive heads, we have now only to consider 
 Negative views of Nature. Under this designa- 
 tion we do not include the monstrous fabulous 
 creations due to even a classical age, such as the 
 sphinx, phoenix, pegasus, hydras, dragons, sala- 
 manders, unicorns, and other fictions of the ima- 
 gination. 
 
 By the negative employment of Nature we prin- 
 cipally understand the viewing of objects in some 
 extreme and apparently perverted aspect, expressed 
 in such phrases as binding the winds, counting the 
 sands, raising monuments of snow, or the like. 
 It may likewise include deceptive appearances in 
 Nature, as when Wordsworth notices the frequent 
 deceitfulness of morning and evening appearances 
 of fine weather, the smoothest seas proving faith- 
 less, the sheltering oak drawing down lightning, — 
 but, appealing to the Saviour, he adds : 
 
NEGATIVE VIEWS. 33$ 
 
 Thy smile is sure, thy plighted word 
 No change can falsify. 
 
 Another form is observable in advice, &c., 
 given ironically ; as in Solomon's concessions to 
 the libertine, and similar instances. 
 
 This department of Nature-Study gives rise to 
 apostrophe, hyperbole, vision, fable, and proverbs ; 
 and it especially aids satire, irony, sarcasm, 
 burlesque, and bombast. 
 
 The pre-eminent advantage of Nature-Study 
 consists in its being the only unerring guide man 
 possesses to aid his judgment, and to form his 
 taste. It is also a powerful instrument in the 
 government of criticism on such works of art as 
 mainly depend on Nature's influences of what- 
 ever kind or quality. 
 
 For example, when the poet assumes the 
 super-natural, and consequently the mysterious, 
 in his language, figures, and sentiments, w r e ask 
 for authority from Nature. The reply may be, 
 Is not Nature all mystery ? The ready answer is, 
 Yes ? but the difference between mysteries in 
 Nature and mysteries in poetry is simply that, in 
 the first we have facts without words, in the last 
 we have words without facts. The passion 
 of love or of grief may well excuse some few 
 lines of exaggeration in any poem, but cannot 
 justify an entire book of non-naturalistic compo- 
 sition. Had Petrarch sung thus of the Laura he 
 has immortalized, his sonnets woultl have been 
 long since forgotten. We may rest satisfied with 
 following Nature, until all its available sources 
 are exhausted. What are griffins, dragons, and 
 salamanders but hideous abortions, incongruous 
 
336 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 compounds of existing animal creation, forming 
 a mass of night-mare associations ? Is there any- 
 thing about such fabulous creatures that has not 
 its features in animals, birds, or fishes ? But it is 
 supposed that although fancy may fail to mould 
 something in clay worthy of being considered 
 supernatural, it can at least reach beyond the 
 present, during the Juror poeticus, and draw fire 
 and spiritual influences from another world. 
 
 These observations are offered as a prelude and 
 an apology for differing from many who approve 
 of the semi-spiritual and wholly sentimental style 
 of Mr. Tennyson's In Memoriam. If it be only 
 an experiment, it is an unhappy one, coming 
 from such an authority, who cannot be considered 
 otherwise than as teaching, while at the same 
 time gratifying his readers through the medium 
 of his highly tuneful muse. What then, for 
 example, we would ask, may be the meaning of 
 No. cxxiii., commencing : — 
 
 That which we dare invoke to bless ; 
 
 Our dearest faith ; our ghastliest doubt ; 
 
 He, They, One, All ; within, without ; 
 The Power in darkness whom we guess ; 
 
 I found Him not in world or sun, 
 
 Or eagle's wing, or insect's eye ; 
 
 Nor thro' the questions men may try, 
 The petty cobwebs we have spun. 
 
 Four other verses follow in the same strain, 
 remotely, uncertainly, and mistily suggesting 
 something or other which the reader may, if so 
 disposed, believe to be highly significant, and in- 
 capable of expression in any other than such 
 incomprehensible phraseology. But as it may be 
 considered unjust to a poet to give so short an 
 
IN MEMORIAM. 337 
 
 extract, we shall quote entire No. cxvm., as 
 being a complete and shorter, if not more intelli- 
 gible piece. 
 
 I trust I have not wasted breath ; 
 I think we are not wholly brain, 
 Magnetic mockeries ; not in vain, 
 
 Like Paul with beasts, I fought with Death ; 
 
 Not only cunning casts in clay : 
 Let Science prove we are, and then 
 What matters Science unto men, 
 
 At least to me ? I would not say, 
 
 Let him, the wiser man who springs 
 Hereafter, up from childhood shape 
 His action like the greater ape, 
 
 But I was born to other things. 
 
 In these lines allusion is made to science with- 
 out science being brought forward, unless it be 
 such as Lord Monboddo propounded ; and these 
 verses are altogether displeasing from their appar- 
 ently concealing some grand conception not to be 
 caught by any neophyte before undergoing some 
 mysterious ordeal or other. Either Homer, 
 Shakspeare, Milton, Burns, and Wordsworth are 
 not poets, or the foregoing is so mystical and 
 contra-natural as not to belong to a high order 
 of poetry ;* but if it is simply an experimental 
 effort, it certainly exhibits a striking contrast to 
 the results of correct Nature-Study. Talleyrand 
 expressed his belief that language was given to 
 man to enable him to conceal his thoughts, a 
 strategical maxim, however, which cannot be too 
 fastidiously shunned by the poet. Feeble as all 
 man's attempts must necessarily be to reflect 
 Nature in works of Art, no art fails so hopelessly 
 
 * See Rev. C. Kingsley's views, quoted chap. i. p. 31. 
 
 Z 
 
338 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 as that fostered by assuming something of the 
 claim to the afflatus of a true necromancy. Now 
 he who copies from Nature must be true to 
 Nature ; but the pretender to the preternatural 
 revels only in day and night dreams, and has but 
 to give the rein to his imagination and fancy to 
 produce a variety of sombre, sunny, and brilliant 
 effects ' signifying nothing.' Even with the best 
 models before them, poets, like painters, may 
 often fail in distinctness of outline and expression. 
 It is well known that no works were more 
 pleasing to the engraver to copy than those of 
 Turner, whose blending of colours, clouds, and 
 figures was often marvellously suggestive of any- 
 thing but what was actually intended by that 
 wonderful master of light and shade. It is said 
 that on one occasion the painter demanded to know 
 why one of his figures had been engraved with 
 wings. The only explanation that could be 
 given was the very natural one that ' It looked 
 so.' To which the artist replied, c Then let it 
 remain,' although he had not himself intended to 
 depict an angel ! Let it not be argued, however, 
 that the more mist, the more majesty, sublimity, 
 and grandeur. True, Nature has its mists, and 
 we may occasionally see the horizon bound by 
 an almost Alpine barrier — but one of clouds ; and 
 dry valleys may appear like lakes, and trees seem 
 to be growing independently of the earth. If 
 we admire such deceptions we may trace in a 
 damp, cracked, plastered wall, the most fantastic 
 landscapes ; we may fancy among the glowing 
 coals in the fire, strange faces and figures ; and 
 on recovering from blindness ' see men as trees 
 
APOSTROPHE. 339 
 
 walking.' And just as our ' eyes are made the 
 fools of the other senses,' so may our reason be 
 subjected to the illusions of the charmer who 
 attunes his muse to sing in an uncouth strain. 
 But with Nature for their guide neither poets 
 nor their readers can possibly go far astray. 
 
 It is said that Aristotle attributes to Pericles, 
 employing the figure in his Funeral Oration, 
 when making a comparison of the loss occasioned 
 by the war, to the act of him who should take 
 the Spring out of the year. We believe that 
 such a figurative mode of expression has never 
 been examined in the light we are about to 
 adopt ; its bearing in Nature-Study, as we shall 
 consider it, is evidently enhanced when we dis- 
 cover its importance even when the object is 
 only to reverse, as it were, the proper and rational 
 use of information resulting from such a study. 
 Yet we shall find that the most telling, lively, 
 and piquant figures, and indeed their very exten- 
 sion, depends on an enlarged knowledge of facts 
 in Nature. Such figures of speech are highly 
 attractive from their novelty, and render con- 
 spicuous and important what might otherwise fall 
 coldly and listlessly on the ear. 
 
 Apostrophe. 
 
 To Death. — 
 
 i. Oh amiable, lovely death ! 
 
 Thou odoriferous stench ! sound rottenness ! 
 
 Arise from the couch of lasting night, 
 
 Thou hate and terror to prosperity, 
 
 And I will kiss thy detestable bones ; 
 
 And put my eye-balls in thy vaulty brows ; 
 
 And ring these fingers with thy household worms ; 
 
 i. King John, Act iii. sc. 4. 
 
 Z 2 
 
34-0 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 And stop this gap of breath with fulsome dust, 
 And be a carrion monster like thyself: 
 Come, grin on me ; and I will think thou smil'st, 
 And buss thee as thy wife ! Misery's love, 
 O, come to me ! 
 
 Satire. 
 Book-worm. — 
 
 2. Come hither, boy, we'll hunt to-day 
 The book-worm, ravening beast of prey, 
 
 Through all the fields of wit he flies ; 
 Dreadful his head with clustering eyes, 
 With horns without, and tusks within, 
 And scales to serve him for a skin. 
 Observe him nearly, lest he climb 
 To wound the bards of ancient time, 
 
 * * * * 
 
 See where his teeth a passage eat ; 
 
 * * * * 
 
 From leaf to leaf, from song to song, 
 He draws the tadpole form along ; 
 
 Insatiate brute, whose teeth abuse 
 The sweetest servants of the Muse ! 
 
 Brute-nature. — 
 
 3. . Brutes find out where their talents lie : 
 
 A bear will not attempt to fly; 
 
 A founder'd horse will oft debate 
 
 Before he tries a five-barr'd gate ; 
 
 A dog by instinct turns aside, 
 
 Who sees the ditch too deep and wide. 
 
 But man we find the only creature, 
 
 Who, led by Folly, combats Nature. 
 
 Prey, Vermin. — 
 
 3*. A prince, the moment he is crown'd, 
 
 Inherits every virtue round, 
 
 But once you fix him in a tomb, 
 
 His virtues fade, his vices bloom ; 
 * * * * 
 
 Hobbes clearly proves that every creature 
 Lives in a state of war by nature. 
 
 2. T. Parnell, The Book-worm. 3. J. Swift, On Poetry 
 A Rhapsody, 1733. 3*. Ibid. 
 
PREY, ETC. 341 
 
 The greater for the smallest watch, 
 But meddle seldom with their match. 
 A whale of moderate size will draw 
 A shoal of herrings down his maw ; 
 A fox with geese his belly crams ; 
 A wolf destroys a thousand lambs : 
 But search among the rhyming race, 
 The brave are worried by the base. 
 
 The vermin only tease and pinch 
 Their foes superior by an inch. 
 So, naturalists observe, a flea 
 Hath smaller fleas that on him prey ; 
 And these have smaller still to bite 'em, 
 And so proceed ad infinitum. 
 
 From Flecknoe down to Howard's time, 
 
 How few have reach'd the low sublime ! 
 
 * * * * 
 
 In bulk there are not more degrees, 
 From elephants to mites in cheese, 
 Than what a curious eye may trace 
 In creatures of the rhyming race. 
 
 * * :\i * 
 
 For though, in nature, depth and height 
 
 Are equally held infinite ; 
 
 In poetry, the height we know ; 
 
 'Tis only infinite below. 
 
 A Critic. — 
 
 4. Honey from silkworms who can gather, 
 
 Or silk from the yellow bee ? 
 The grass may grow in winter weather 
 As soon as hate in me. 
 
 Critics. — 
 
 5. 'twere a sin to rob them of their mite. 
 
 Yet ne'er one sprig of laurel graced these ribalds. 
 From slashing Bentley down to peddling Tibbalds : 
 Each wight who reads not, and but scans and spells. 
 Each word-catcher that lives on syllables, 
 Even such small critics some regard may claim, 
 Preserved in Milton's or in Shakspeares name. 
 Pretty ! in amber to observe the forms 
 Of hairs, or straws, or dirt, or grubs, or worms ! 
 The things, we know, are neither rich nor rare, 
 But wonder how they possibly got there. 
 
 4. Shelley, Lines to a Critic. 5. Pope's Satires. 
 
34 2 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 DULNESS. 
 
 5*. See now, what Dulness and her sons admire ! 
 
 Thence a new world, to nature's laws unknown, 
 Breaks out refulgent, with a heaven its own : 
 Another Cynthia her new journey runs, 
 And other planets circle other suns. 
 The forests dance, the rivers upward rise, 
 Whales sport in woods, and dolphins in the skies ; 
 And last, to give the whole creation grace, 
 Lo ! one vast egg produces human race. 
 
 * * *- * 
 
 Immortal Rich !* how calm he sits at ease, 
 
 'Mid snows of paper, and fierce hail of pease ; 
 
 And, proud his mistress' order to perform, 
 
 Rides in the whirlwind, and directs the storm. B. iii. 
 *■ * * * 
 
 Now flamed the dog-star's unpropitious ray, 
 Smote every brain, and wither'd every bay; 
 Sick was the sun, the owl forsook his bower, 
 The moon-struck prophet felt the madding hour; 
 Then rose the seed of Chaos, and of Night, 
 To blot out order, and extinguish light, 
 Of dull and venal a new world to mould, 
 And bring Saturnian days of lead and gold. 
 
 # * # •* 
 
 Now to pure space lifts her ecstatic stare, 
 
 Now running round the circle, finds it square. B. iv. 
 
 The Stoics. — 
 
 6. Beat out their brains in fight and study, 
 To prove that virtue is a body ; 
 
 That bonum is an animal, 
 
 Made good with stout polemic brawl. 20. 
 
 Woman. — 
 
 7. Could we with ink the ocean fill, 
 
 Were earth of parchment made ; 
 Were every single stick a quill, 
 
 Each man a scribe by trade ; 
 To write the tricks of half the sex, 
 
 Would drink that ocean dry. 
 Gallants, beware, look sharp, take care ; 
 
 The blind eat many a fly. 
 
 5*. Dunciad. 6. Hudibras, Part II. canto ii. 7. Anon, 
 A satire in imitation of Guarini. 
 
 * John Rich, manager of Covent Garden Theatre. 
 
ROBBERY, ETC. 343 
 
 Robbery. — 
 
 Take wealth and lives together; 
 
 Do villany, do, since you profess to do't, 
 Like workmen : I'll example you with thievery. 
 The sun's a thief, and with his great attraction 
 Robs the vast sea : the moon's an arrant thief, 
 And her pale fire she snatches from the sun ; 
 The sea's a thief, whose liquid surge resolves 
 The moon into salt tears ; the earth's a thief, 
 That feeds and breeds by a composture stolen 
 From general excrement : each thing's a thief, 
 The laws, your curb and whip, in their rough power 
 Have uncheck'd theft. 
 
 Hyperbole. 
 Army. — 
 
 9. As swarms of bees, that pour in ceaseless stream 
 From out the crevice of some hollow rock, 
 Now clustering, and anon 'mid vernal flowers, 
 Some here, some there, in busy numbers fly; 
 
 >!< >!; %z ;;; 
 
 Great was the din ; and as the mighty mass 
 Sat down, the solid earth beneath them groaned. 
 
 10. [Agamemnon — commands the Greeks to war.] 
 
 As when a wasting fire, on mountain tops, 
 Hath seized the blazing woods, afar is seen 
 The glaring light ; so, as they moved, to Heaven 525 
 Flashed the bright glitter of their burnished arms. 
 
 As various tribes of winged fowl, or geese, 
 Or cranes, or long-necked swans, on Asian mead, 
 Besides Cayster's stream, now here, now there, 
 Disporting, ply their wings ; then settle down 530 
 With clamorous noise, that all the mead resounds ; 
 So to Scamander's plain, from tents and ships, 
 Poured forth the countless tribes ; the firm earth 
 
 groaned 
 Beneath the tramp of steeds and armed men. 
 Upon Scamander's flowery mead they stood, 535 
 Unnumbered as the vernal leaves and flowers. 
 
 Or as the multitudinous swarms of flies, 
 That round the cattle-sheds in spring-tide pour. 
 
 8. Timbn of Athens, Act iv. sc. 3. 9, 10. Lord 
 Derby's Homer. 
 
344 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Love. — 
 
 first part. 
 
 i. Over the mountains, 
 
 And under the waves, 
 Over the fountains 
 
 And under the graves, 
 Under floods which are deepest, 
 
 Which do Neptune obey, 
 Over rocks which are steepest, 
 
 Love will find out the way. 
 
 Where there is no place 
 
 For the glow-worm to lie, 
 Where there is no place 
 
 For the receipt of a fly, 
 Where the gnat dares not venture, 
 
 Lest herself fast she lay, 
 
 But if Love come he will enter, 
 
 And find out the way. 
 * #. * * 
 
 SECOND PART. 
 
 If the earth should part him, 
 
 He would gallop it o'er ; 
 If the seas should o'erthwart him, 
 
 He would swim to the shore. 
 Should his love become a swallow, 
 
 Through the air to stray, 
 Love will lend wings to follow, 
 
 And will find out the way. 
 
 There is no striving 
 
 To cross his intent, 
 There is no contriving 
 
 His plots to prevent; 
 But if once the message greet him, 
 
 That his true love doth stay, 
 If death should come and meet him, 
 
 Love will find out the way. 
 
 Mermaid. — 
 
 2. Thou remember'st 
 
 Since once I sat upon a promontory, 
 And heard a mermaid, on a dolphin's back, 
 Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath, 
 That the rude sea grew civil at her song ; 
 
 i. Bell's Early Ballads: Truth's Integrity. 2. Mid- 
 summer Night's Dream. 
 
OCEAN, ETC. 345 
 
 And certain stars shot madly from their spheres, 
 To hear the sea-maid's music. 
 
 That very time I saw, (but thou could'st not,) 
 Flying between the cold moon and the earth, 
 Cupid all-arm'd : a certain aim he took 
 At a fair vestal, throned by the west ; 
 
 Yet mark'd I where the bolt of Cupid fell : 
 
 It fell upon a little western flower, — 
 
 Before, milk-white ; now purple with love's wound, — 
 
 And maidens call it, love-in-idleness. 
 
 Ocean grave. — 
 
 3. Full fathoms five thy father lies ; 
 
 Of his bones are coral made ; 
 Those are pearls, that were his eyes : 
 
 Nothing of him that doth fade, 
 But doth suffer a sea-change 
 Into something rich and strange. 
 Sea-nymphs hourly ring their knell : 
 Hark ! now I hear them, — ding-dong, bell. 
 
 Cesar. — 
 
 4. Cassius. Why, man, he [Caesar] doth bestride the 
 
 narrow world, 
 Like a Colossus ; and we petty men 
 Walk under his huge legs, and peep about 
 To find ourselves dishonourable graves. 
 
 Blood. — 
 
 5. Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood 
 Clean from my hand ? No ; this my hand will rather 
 The multitudinous sea incarnadine, 
 
 Making the green — one red. Act ii. sc. 2. 
 
 6. Lady M. Here's the smell of blood still : all the 
 perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. 
 Oh ! oh ! oh ! Act iv. sc. 1. 
 
 Discord. — 
 
 7. Nay, had I the power, I should 
 
 Pour the sweet milk of concord into hell, 
 Uproar the universal peace, confound 
 
 All unity on earth. Act iv. sc. 3. 
 
 3. Tempest, Act 1, sc. 2. 4. Julius Ccesar, Act i. sc. 2. 
 5, 6, 7. Macbeth. 
 
34 6 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 A Mob. — 
 
 8. . He that depends 
 
 Upon your favours, swims with fins of lead, 
 
 And hews down oaks with rushes. Act i. sc. i. 
 
 Submission. — 
 
 9. . My mother bows ; 
 
 As if Olympus to a mole-hill should 
 
 In supplication nod : Act v. sc. 3. 
 
 Triumph. — 
 
 1. Why, hark you ; 
 
 The trumpets, sackbuts, psalteries, and fifes, 
 Tabors, and cymbals, and the shouting Romans, 
 Make the sun dance. Act v. sc. 4. 
 
 Orpheus. — 
 
 2. For Orpheus' lute was strung with poet's sinews ; 
 Whose golden touch could soften steel and stones, 
 Make tigers tame, and huge leviathans 
 
 Forsake unsounded deeps to dance on sands. 
 
 3. Orpheus with his lute made trees, 
 And the mountain-tops that freeze, 
 
 Bow themselves, when he did sing. 
 To his music, plants and flowers 
 Ever spring : as sun, and showers 
 
 There had made a lasting spring. 
 Everything that heard him play, 
 Even the billows of the sea, 
 
 Hung their heads, and then lay by. Act iii. sc. 1, 
 
 Speed. — 
 
 4. O ! for a horse with wings !- 
 
 (Milford-Haven) Why not I 
 
 Glide thither in a day ? Act iii. sc. 2. 
 
 Love's wishes. — 
 
 5. If I had an hundred hearts 
 
 Never should one stray from thee, 
 If I had an hundred hearts 
 Every one should feel thy darts. 
 
 Oh, my dearest, &c. 
 
 8, 9, 1. Coriolanus. 2. Two Gentlemen of Verona, 
 Act iii. sc. 2. 3. King Henry VIII. 4. Cymbeline. 
 
 5. Oxenford's French Songs; The Abbe de Lattaignant 's 
 Wishes. 
 
BOMBAST AND IRONY. 347 
 
 If an hundred eyes were mine, 
 
 Thee alone those eyes would see ; 
 If an hundred eyes were mine 
 Every one on thee would shine. 
 
 Oh, my dearest, &c. 
 
 If an hundred tongues I had, 
 
 They should speak of nought but thee ; 
 If an hundred tongues I had, 
 All should talk of thee, like mad. 
 
 Oh, my dearest, &c. 
 
 >£ ^ Sj< %. 
 
 If five hundred souls you were 
 You for her should rivals be, 
 If five hundred souls you were 
 All should love this beauty rare. 
 
 Oh, my dearest, &c. 
 
 Had you reach'd your hundredth year — 
 
 Young with her would Nestor be, — 
 Had you reach'd your hundredth year 
 Spring through her would re-appear. 
 Oh, my dearest, &c. 
 
 Bombast and Irony. 
 
 The Morn. — 
 
 6. The sun had long since, in the lap 
 
 Of Thetis, taken out his nap, 30 
 
 And, like a lobster boil'd, the morn 
 From black to red began to turn. 
 
 Nature Inverted. — 
 
 7. Figures ill pair'd, and similes unlike. 
 
 How Time himself stands still at her [Dulness'] 
 
 command, 
 Realms shift their place, and ocean turns to land, 
 Here gay description iEgypt glads with showers, 
 Or gives to Zembla fruits, to Barca flowers ; 
 Glittering with ice here hoary hills are seen, 
 There painted valleys of eternal green, 
 In cold December fragrant chaplets blow, 
 And heavy harvests nod beneath the snow. — B. I. 
 * * * * 
 
 And gentle Dulness ever loves a joke. 
 
 A poet's form she placed before their eyes, 
 
 And bade the nimblest racer seize the prize ; 
 
 6. Hudibras, P. ii. c. 2. 7. The Dunciad. 
 
348 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 She form'd this image of well-bodied air ; 
 
 With pert flat eyes she window'd well his head ; 
 
 A brain of feathers, and a heart of lead. 
 
 [Curl runs swift] 
 
 As when a dab-chick waddles through the copse 
 
 On feet and wings, and flies, and wades, and 
 
 hops.— B. II. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Thus he, for them a ray of reason stole, 
 Half through the solid darkness of his soul ; 
 
 Thence a new world, to nature's laws unknown, 
 
 Breaks out refulgent, with a heaven its own : 
 
 * * * * 
 
 And other planets circle other suns. 
 
 The forests dance, the rivers upwards rise, 
 
 Whales sport in woods, and dolphins in the skies ; 
 
 And last, to give the whole creation grace, 
 
 Lo ! one vast egg produces human race. — B. III. 
 
 The foregoing alludes to certain dramas of 
 which Dr. Faustus was the subject. 
 
 Proverbs. 
 
 Dreams. — 
 
 1. Whoso regardeth dreams is like him that catcheth at 
 
 a shadow, and followeth after the wind. 
 
 Greek Proverbs. — 
 
 2. He ploughs the air. 
 
 He washes the Ethiopian. 
 He measures a twig. 
 He demands tribute of the dead. 
 He holds the serpent by the tail. 
 He takes the bull by the horns. 
 He makes clothes for fishes. 
 He catches the wind with a net. 
 He changes a fly into an elephant. 
 He takes the spring from the year. 
 He is making ropes of sand. 
 He is ploughing a rock. 
 He is sowing in the sand. 
 He takes oil to extinguish fire. 
 He chastises the dead. 
 
 1. Ecclesiasticus xxxiv. 2. 
 
PROVERBS. 349 
 
 He seeks water in the sea. 
 
 He puts a rope to the eye of a needle. 
 
 He draws water with a sieve. 
 
 He gives straw to his dog, and bones to his ass. 
 
 He numbers the waves. 
 
 He paves the meadow. 
 
 He paints the dead. 
 
 He seeks wool on an ass. 
 
 He digs the well at the river. 
 
 He roasts snow in a furnace. 
 
 He is building a bridge over the sea. 
 
 Persian Proverbs. — 
 
 3. He gives water from the ocean. (From an abundant 
 
 source — not his own). 
 He holds the wind in his hand. (Can retain 
 
 nothing.) 
 The sun cannot be hid with clay. (Something 
 
 self-evident.) 
 You cannot make a hole in the sky. (Impossibili- 
 ties). 
 A painting on water. (Labour in vain, transitory). 
 He binds the water with thread. (Labour in vain, 
 
 transitory.) 
 To pound water in a mortar. (Labour in vain, 
 
 transitory). 
 Should even the water of life fall from the clouds, 
 
 you would never get fruit from the willow. 
 He hides fire with straw. 
 
 Fire in winter is better than the damask rose. 
 He wants an eagle's tear. (Something difficult or 
 
 impossible.) 
 If you sow thorns you cannot cut out jasmine. 
 If you stare at the sun it will hurt your eyes and 
 
 not the sun. 
 The breath of a gnat will not put out the sun. 
 
 HlNDOOSTANEE. 
 
 4. The river flowing upwards. (Any improbability). 
 
 Night. — 
 
 5. (Malcolm says,) The night is long that never finds 
 
 the day. 
 
 3, 4. T. Roebuck's Collection of Proverbs, 1824. 
 5. Macbeth. 
 
35 O NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Rabelais describing what he saw concerning 
 Queen Whim's officers, states that : — 
 
 A great number made blackamoors white, 
 Others ploughed the land with foxes. 
 Others extracted water out of pumice-stone. 
 Others sheared asses, and thus got long wool. 
 Others pitched nets to catch the wind ; and 
 Others cut fire into stakes with a knife, and drew 
 water with a fish-net. 
 
 Swift, following the example set by his great 
 prototype, gives us an account in his Gullivers 
 Travels of the grand Academy of Lagado. 
 Of one man he saw there he assures us : — 
 
 He had been eight years upon a project for 
 extracting sunbeams out of cucumbers. 
 
 Another was at work to calcine ice into gunpowder, 
 and had a treatise concerning the malleability 
 of fire. 
 
 Another was substituting spiders for silkworms ; 
 and so in like manner equally vain were the 
 schemes of others all equally deluded. 
 
 Fable, etc. 
 
 Forest and Floods. — 
 
 6. He answered me, and said, I went into a forest 
 
 into a plain, and the trees took counsel, (13.) 
 
 And said, Come, let us go and make war against 
 the sea, that it may depart away before us, and 
 that we may make us more woods. (14.) 
 
 The floods of the sea in like manner took counsel, 
 and said, Come, let us go up and subdue the woods 
 of the plain, that there also we may make us 
 another country. (15.) 
 
 The thought of the wood was in vain, for the fire 
 came and consumed it. (16.) 
 
 The thought of the floods of the sea came like- 
 wise to nought, for the sand stood up and stopped 
 them. (17.) 
 
 The Almighty. — 
 
 7. O Lord thou bearest rule, of every wood of 
 
 the earth, and of all the trees thereof, thou hast 
 chosen thee one only vine : (23.) 
 
 6. 2 Esrfras iv. 7. Ibid. v. 
 
FABLE, ETC. 35 I 
 
 And of all lands of the whole world thou hast 
 chosen thee one pit : and of all the flowers there of 
 one lily : (24.) 
 
 And of all the depths of the sea thou hast filled thee 
 one river : ( 2 5«) 
 
 And of all the fowls that are created thou hast 
 named thee one dove : and of all the cattle that 
 are made thou hast provided thee one sheep. (26.) 
 * # * * 
 
 And he said unto me, Number me all things that 
 are not yet come, gather me together the drops 
 that are scattered abroad, make me the flowers 
 green again that are withered. (36.) 
 
 Open me the places that are closed, and bring me 
 forth the winds that in them are shut up, shew 
 me the image of a voice : and then I will declare 
 to thee the thing thou labourest to know. (37.) 
 
 Flint and Steel. — 
 
 8. Cruelly bent, it chanced the Flint 
 
 Ill-treated the Steel one day ; 
 And wounding, gave it many a dint, 
 To draw its sparks away. 
 
 When laid aside, this angry cried 
 To that, ' What would your value be 
 
 Without my help ?' the Flint replied, 
 1 As much as yours, sir, but for me.' 
 
 This lesson I write, my friends to incite ; 
 
 Their talents, however great, 
 That they must study with them unite, 
 
 To duly cultivate. 
 
 The Flint gives light with help of the Steel, 
 And study alone will talent reveal ; 
 For neither suffice if found apart, 
 Whatever the talent or the art. 
 
 Typical, etc. 
 
 The Universe. — 
 
 9. Canst thou bind together the brilliant Pleiades ? 
 Or canst thou loose the bands of Orion ? 
 
 Canst thou bring the stars of the Zodiac in their 
 season ? 
 
 8. J. Kennedy's Poets of Spain : Tomas de Iriarti, The 
 Fluit and Steel. 9. Herder's History of Hebrew Poetry : 
 Job xxviii. 
 
35 2 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 And lead forth the Bear with her young ? 
 
 Knowest thou the laws of the heavens above ? 
 
 Or hast thou given a decree to the earth beneath ? 
 
 Canst thou lift up thy voice to the clouds, 
 
 And enter into them clothed with floods ? 
 
 Canst thou send the lightnings that they shall go, 
 
 And say to thee, ' Here are we' ? 
 
 Who gave understanding to the flying clouds ? 
 
 Or intelligence to the meteors of the air ? 
 
 Who by his wisdom hath numbered the drops of rain ? 
 
 Hath sent down the gentle showers from heaven, 
 
 And watered the dust, that it might unite, 
 
 And the clods of the earth cleave together ? 
 
 The Almighty. — 
 
 i. Wilt thou find out the wisdom of Eloah ? 
 Wilt thou fathom the perfection of Shaddai ? 
 It is high as heaven, what wilt thou do ? 
 Deeper than the abyss, what dost thou know ? 
 Its measure is longer than the earth, 
 And broader than the sea. 
 
 Golden Age. — 
 
 2. The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, 
 The leopard shall lie down with the kid, 
 
 The calf, the young lion, and the fatling together, 
 And a little child shall lead them. 
 
 The cow and the bear shall feed quietly ; 
 Their young ones shall lie down together, 
 And the lion shall eat straw like the ox. 
 
 The suckling shall play on the hole of the asp. 
 The weaned child on the cockatrice's den ; 
 There shall be none to hurt nor destroy 
 In all my holy mountain, 
 
 For the earth is full of the knowledge of Jehovah, 
 As the waters cover the sea. 
 
 Wisdom's Glory. — 
 
 3. I was exalted like a cedar in Libanus, and as a cypress 
 
 tree upon the mountains of Hermon. (13.) 
 
 I was exalted like a palm tree in En-gaddi, and as a 
 rose plant in Jericho ; as a fair olive tree in a plea- 
 sant field, and grew up as a plane tree by the 
 water. (14O 
 
 1. Herder's History of Hebrew Poetry ; jfob xi. 7-9. 
 2. Ibid., Isaiah xi. 6. 3. Ecclesiasticus xxiv. 
 
THE UNSEARCHABLE, ETC. ^53 
 
 I gave a sweet smell like cinnamon and aspalathus, 
 and I yielded a pleasant odour like the best myrrh, 
 as galbanum, and onyx, and sweet storax, and as 
 the fume of frankincense in the tabernacle. (15.) 
 
 As the turpentine tree I stretched out my branches, 
 and my branches are the branches of honour and 
 grace. ( x 6.) 
 
 [ Wisdom's fruit. ] 
 As the vine brought I forth pleasant savour, and my 
 flowers are the fruit of honour and riches. (17.) 
 The Unsearchable. — 
 
 4. Weigh me the fire ; or canst thou find 
 A way to measure out the wind ; 
 Distinguish all those floods that are 
 Mixt in that watery theatre ; 
 
 And taste thou them as saltless there 
 As in their channel first they were ; 
 Tell me the people that do keep 
 Within the kingdoms of the deep ; 
 Or fetch me back that cloud again, 
 Beshivered into seeds of rain ; 
 Tell me the motes, dust, sands, and spears 
 Of corn when summer shakes his ears ; 
 Show me that world of stars, and whence 
 They noiseless spill their influence ; 
 This if thou canst, then show me Him 
 That rides the glorious Cherubim. 
 
 Intercourse. — 
 
 5. Much less can bird with beast, or fish with fowl, 
 So well converse, nor with the ox the ape ; 
 Worse then can man with beast, and least of all. 
 
 Seasonable. — 
 
 6. The crow doth sing as sweetly as the lark, 
 When neither is attended ; and I think, 
 The nightingale, if she should sing by day, 
 When every goose is cackling, would be thought 
 No better a musician than the wren. 
 
 How many things by season season'd are 
 To their right praise, and true perfection ! — 
 * * * * 
 
 This night, methinks, is but the daylight sick, 
 It looks a little paler ; 'tis a day, 
 Such as the day is when the sun is hid. 
 
 4. Herrick, God unsearchable. 5. Paradise Lost. 6. Mer- 
 chant of Venice, Act v. sc. 1. 
 
 2 A 
 
354 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Mind. — 
 
 7. For 'tis the mind that makes the body rich ; 
 
 And as the sun breaks through the darkest clouds, 
 So honour peereth in the meanest habit. 
 What, is the jay more precious than the lark, 
 Because his feathers are more beautiful ? 
 Or is the adder better than the eel, 
 Because his painted skin contents the eye ? 
 
 8. Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased ; 
 Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow ; 
 Raze out the written troubles of the brain ; 
 And, with some sweet oblivious antidote, 
 Cleanse the foul bosom of that perilous stuff, 
 Which weighs upon the heart ? A. v. s. 3. 
 
 Self-Deception. — 
 
 9. All places that the eye of heaven visits 
 Are to a wise man ports and happy havens. 
 
 [He further advises :] 
 Suppose the singing birds, musicians ; 
 The grass whereon thou tread'st, the presence 
 
 strew'd, 
 The flowers, fair ladies ; A. i. s. 3. 
 
 Contrasts. — 
 
 1. The sparrow is no swallow, the gad-fly is no bee, 
 The crowfoot is no rose, and no grape the gooseberry; 
 No brass is gold, no bran as honey-comb is sweet, 
 And summer when it comes the thrush is pleased to 
 
 greet ; 
 The ducats of the rich, however bright and many, 
 Need never blush to own the poor man's single 
 
 penny. 
 
 Belief. — 
 
 2. Although the vine its fruit deny, 
 
 Although the olive yield no oil, 
 The withering fig-tree droop and die, 
 
 The field elude the tiller's toil ; 
 The empty stall no herd afford, 
 
 And perish all the bleating race, — 
 Yet will I triumph in the Lord, 
 
 The God of my salvation praise. 
 
 7. Taming of the Shrew, A. iv. s. 3. 8. Macbeth. 9. King 
 Richard II. 1. Bowring's Magyar Poems; Hungarian 
 Popular Song, The Difference. 2. C. Wesley, Unbelief 
 Repelled. 
 
NON-NATURAL. 355 
 
 Non-natural.- — ■ 
 
 8. Which state were drearier of a dreary twain — 
 Eternal sunshine or eternal rain ? 
 
 g. When the waters take to running up-hill, 
 Then will they prosper that sit still. 
 
 1. Why do not birds and fishes rise from earth ? 
 And man and trees from water take their birth ? 
 Why do not herds and flocks drop down from air ? 
 Wild creatures and untam'd spring everywhere ? 
 The same tree would not rise from the same root, 
 The cherry would not blush in the same fruit ; 
 Nought fixt and constant be, but every year 
 Whole Nature change, and all things all things bear. 
 
 * * ■* •* 
 
 Besides, why is ripe corn in summer found ? 
 Why not bald winter with fresh roses crown'd ? 
 Why not his cups o'erflow with new press'd wine, 
 But sweaty autumn only treads the Vine ? 
 
 * x * * 
 
 Besides, no need of time for things to grow, 
 For that would be a measure e'en too slow ; 
 But in one instant, if from nought began, 
 A shrub might be a tree, a boy a man. 
 
 2. The winter bears no buds, 
 The summer yields no ice : 
 
 The fire which young hearts floods 
 The old man feels not twice. 
 
 else had the sprin< 
 
 Perpetual smil'd on earth with verdant flow'rs, 
 Equal in days and nights, except in those 
 Beyond the polar circles ; to them day 
 Had unbenighted shone, while the low sun 
 * * * * 
 
 Had rounded still th' horizon, and not known 
 Or east or west, which had forbid the snow 
 From cold Estotiland, and south so far 
 Beneath Magellan. 
 
 4. Iago. But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve 
 For daws to peck at : I am not what I am. A. i. s. 1. 
 
 Oth. No, my heart is turned to stone ; I strike it, and 
 it hurts my hand. * * * * O, she will sing the 
 savageness out of a bear! A. iv. s. 1. 
 
 8, 9. Thompson's Sales Attici, Euripides. 1. Creech's 
 Lucretius, B. I. 2. W. R. Alger's Eastern Poetry. 
 3. Paradise Lost. 4. Othello. 
 
 2 A 2 
 
356 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 5. O man ! whose weakness dare rebel 
 Against the Almighty's strength, draw nigh 
 
 And listen. 
 
 * * * 
 
 Go ! hook the huge leviathan 
 
 * - # • * 
 
 A millstone is his heart — his row 
 
 Of teeth like sickles, threat'ning still ; 
 
 Who shall attack him 
 
 His eyes with, burning fury roll, 
 As in a forge the scarlet coal. 
 
 6. And shall we own such judgments ? no — as soon 
 Seek roses in December — ice in June. 
 
 The Impossible. — 
 
 7. Who can number the sand of the sea, and the drops 
 
 of rain, and the days of eternity ? 
 
 8. Who seeks to rival Pindar's fame 
 With waxen wings, lulus flies ; 
 To give, like Icarus, a name 
 
 To seas, where quenched his folly lies. 
 
 9. The wise man will not roam afar 
 
 For what at home his finding naught can hinder : 
 
 He will not try to pluck a star 
 
 To kindle with its light a piece of tinder. 
 
 in vain would you seek from a garden of 
 
 willows 
 To collect fruit as beneath them you roam. 
 
 2. It is the senselessness of fools, in opposition to 
 
 wisdom, 
 That, in the heat of summer, raiseth a tower of snow. 
 
 3. I asked Philosophy how I should 
 Have of her the thing I would; 
 She answered me when I was able, 
 To make the water malleable, 
 
 Or else the way if I could find, 
 To measure out a yard of wind : 
 
 5. Bowring's Russian Poets, Lomonossov's Ode. 6. 
 English Bards and Scotch Reviewers. 7. Ecclesiasticus i. 2. 
 
 8. Lord Derby's Translation of Horace, Od., iv. 2. 
 
 9. W. R. Alger's Eastern Poetry. 1. Ibid. 2. Raverty's 
 Afghan Poetry. 3. Ashmole's Theatricum Chemicum, 
 1652. 
 
THE IMPOSSIBLE. 3^7 
 
 Then shalt thou have thine own desire, 
 When thou canst weigh an ounce of fire : 
 Unless that thou canst do these three, 
 Content thyself, thou get'st not me. 
 
 4. The seas shall waste, the skies in smoke decay, 
 Rocks fall to dust, and mountains melt away ; 
 But fix'd his word, his saving power remains : 
 Thy realm for ever lasts, thy own Messiah reigns. 
 
 5. [Biron.] 
 
 Why should I joy in an abortive birth ? 
 
 At Christmas I no more desire a rose, 
 
 Than wish a snow in May's new-fangled shows ; 
 
 But like of each thing, that in season grows. 
 
 6. [Hermia.] 1 will believe as soon, 
 
 This whole earth may be bored ; and that the moon 
 
 May through the centre creep, and so displease 
 
 Her brother's noon-tide with the Antipodes. A. iii. s. 2. 
 
 7. To gild refined gold, to paint the lily, 
 To throw a perfume on the violet, 
 
 To smooth the ice, or add another hue 
 
 Unto the rainbow, or with taper-light 
 
 To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish, 
 
 Is wasteful, and ridiculous excess. A. iv. s. 2. 
 
 8. [Duke of York.] , and take from Time 
 
 His charters and his customary rights ; 
 
 Let not to-morrow then ensue to-day. 
 
 9. Alas, poor duke ! the task he undertakes 
 
 Is numbering sands and drinking oceans dry. 
 
 1. Oh, who can hold a fire in his hand, 
 By thinking on the frosty Caucasus ? 
 Or cloy the hungry edge of appetite, 
 By bare imagination of a feast ? 
 
 Or wallow naked in December snow, 
 
 By thinking on fantastic summer's heat ? A. i. s. 3. 
 
 2. By heaven, methinks, it were an easy leap, 
 
 To pluck bright honour from the pale-fac'd moon ; 
 Or to dive into the bottom of the deep, 
 Where fathom-line could never touch the ground, 
 And pluck up drowned honour by the locks. 
 
 5. Love's Labour Lost. 6. Midsummer Night's Dream. 
 7. King John, Act. iv. sc. 9. 8. King Richard II. 
 9. Ibid. 1. Ibid. 2. King Henry IV. 1st Part. A. i. s. 3. 
 
358 
 
 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 3. {Aaron says) — 
 
 For all the water in the ocean 
 
 Can never turn the swan's black legs to white, 
 
 Although she lave them hourly in the flood. 
 
 4. And thou all-shaking thunder, 
 
 Strike flat the thick rotundity o' the world ! 
 
 5. Go, wondrous creature ! mount where science guides, 
 Go, measure earth, weigh air, and state the tides ; 
 Instruct the planets in what orbs to run, 
 
 Correct old Time, and regulate the sun ; 
 
 Love, &c. — 
 
 6. Like winter rose, and summer ice, 
 Her joys are still untimely ; 
 Before her hope, behind remorse, 
 Fair first, in fine unseemly. 
 
 Plough not the seas, sow not the sands, 
 Leave off your idle pain ; 
 Seek other mistress for your minds, 
 Love's service is in vain. 
 
 7. First shall the heavens want starry light, 
 The seas be robbed of their waves, 
 
 The day want sun, and sun want bright, 
 
 The night want shade, 
 
 The April flowers, and leaves, and tree, 
 Before I false my faith to thee. 
 
 First shall the top of highest hill 
 By humble plains be overpry'd, 
 * * * * 
 
 And fish forsake the water glide, 
 And Iris lose her colour'd weed, 
 Before I false thee at thy need. 
 
 First Time shall stay his stayless race, 
 And Winter bless his brows with corn, 
 And Snow bemoisten July's face, 
 And Winter spring, and Summer mourn, 
 
 Before my pen, 
 
 Cease to recite thy sacred name. 
 
 8. Mala. If all the pleasures were distill'd 
 Of every flower in every field, 
 
 3. Titus Andronicus. 4. King Lear. 5. Pope's Essay 
 on Man. 6. R. Southwell, Love's servile Lot. 7. Dr. T. 
 Lodge, Rosander's Sonetto. 8. Ben Jonson, From The 
 Penates. 
 
LOVE, ETC. 359 
 
 And all that Hybla's hives do yield, 
 Were into one broad mazer fill'd ; 
 If, thereto, were added all the gums, 
 And spice that from Panchaia comes, 
 The odour that Hydaspes lends, 
 Or Phoenix proves before she ends ; 
 If all the air my Flora drew, 
 Or spirit that Zephyre ever blew ; 
 Were put therein ; and all the dew 
 That every rosy morning knew ; 
 Yet all diffused upon this bower, 
 To make one sweet detaining hour, 
 Were much too little 
 
 9. Fond that I am to ask ! whoe'er 
 
 Did yet see thought ? or silence hear ? 
 Safe from the search of human eye 
 These arrows (as their ways are) fly: 
 
 The flights of angels part 
 
 Not air with so much art ; 
 
 And snows on streams, we may 
 
 Say, louder fall than they. 
 
 1 . They meet with but unwholesome springs, 
 
 And summers which infectious are, 
 They hear but when the mermaid sings, 
 
 And only see the falling star, 
 Who ever dare 
 Affirm no woman chaste and fair. 
 
 2. Didst thou but know the inly touch of love, 
 Thou would'st as soon 'go kindle fire with snow, 
 
 As seek to quench the fire of love with words, sc. 7. 
 
 3. Whan cockle-shells turn siller bells, 
 
 And mussels grow on every tree, 
 Whan frost and snaw sail warm us aw, 
 Then sail my love prove true to me. 
 
 4. And I will luve thee still, my dear, 
 
 Till a' the seas gang dry, my Dear, 
 And the rocks melt wi' the sun ; 
 
 9. W. Cartwright, Love's Darts. 1. W. Habington's 
 Poem. 2. Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act ii. 3. Burns, 
 Lady BothwelVs Lament. 4. Ibid., A red, red Rose. 
 
360 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 5. The blude-red rose at Yule may blaw, 
 The simmer lilies bloom in snaw, 
 The frost may freeze the deepest sea ; 
 
 But an auld man shall never daunton [subdue] me. 
 
 6. Bind the sea to slumber stilly, 
 Bind the odour of the lily, 
 Bind the aspen ne'er to quiver, 
 Then bind love to last for ever ! 
 
 •x- * * # 
 
 Can you keep the bee from ranging, 
 Or the ring-dove's neck from changing ? 
 No ! nor fettered Love from dying 
 In the knot there's no untying. 
 
 7. A weary lot is thine, fair maid, 
 
 A weary lot is thine ! 
 To pull the thorn thy brow to braid 
 And press the rue for wine. 
 * * * * 
 
 The morn is merry June, I trow, 
 
 The rose is budding fain ; 
 But she shall bloom in winter snow 
 
 Ere we two meet again. 
 
 We have thus before us a variety of poetical 
 specimens headed Apostrophe, Satire, Hyperbole, 
 Bombast, Didactic, Proverbial, Fable, and Typical. 
 The poet's references to Nature in these examples 
 are rather for contrast than for any descriptive 
 purpose; his form of expression is therefore 
 generally as curt as any proverbial saying. Mere 
 negation would not come within the scope of 
 our present criticism, as when Mrs. Hemans de- 
 scribes The Palm Tree as an exotic, thus : — 
 
 It waved not through an eastern sky, * * * 
 It was not fanned by southern breeze, * * * 
 Nor did its graceful shadows sleep 
 O'er stream of Afric, lone and deep ; 
 
 all which is merely allusive to its exiled state, 
 and throughout entirely natural. 
 
 5. Burns, The blude-red Rose. 6. T. Campbell, Song. 
 7, Sir W. Scott, The Rover. 
 
NEGATIVE VIEWS. 36 1 
 
 Sometimes we find poets using negative exam- 
 ples from Nature in a comparative sense, as in 
 Paradise Lost, in allusion to ' smiles ' : — 
 
 this sweet intercourse 
 
 Of looks and smiles ; for smiles from reason flow, 
 To brutes deny'd, 
 
 Here, as in similar instances, we have no more 
 than the plain statement of some undeniable fact, 
 unconnected with any such suggestion as would 
 occur were we to say : c When brutes shall smile,' 
 &c, thus entirely altering the mode of applying 
 some obvious fact derived from Nature. 
 
 There are frequent examples among our older 
 poets which it were hypercritical to notice had 
 they not been adopted as authority for extending 
 such fanciful improvements on Nature. Shak- 
 speare says : — 
 
 Sweet are the uses of adversity, 
 
 Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, 
 
 Wears yet a precious jewel in his head. 
 
 Thomas Gray, in The Progress of Poesy, 
 pleasingly enough deludes us with : — 
 
 A thousand rills their mazy progress take : 
 The laughing flowers, that round them blow, 
 Drink life and fragrance as they flow. 
 
 And so likewise in Thomson's Seasons, describing 
 Spring, the poet says : — 
 
 the landscape laughs around. 
 
 Even Wordsworth expresses himself in a way 
 that demands a pause for reflection when, in his 
 Intimations of Immortality he suggests that : — 
 
 Custom hangs upon us, with a weight 
 Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life. 
 
362 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 We almost unconsciously exclaim, 4 Heavy as 
 frost 5 ! 
 
 A modern writer, treating on Oriental poetry, 
 alludes to certain characteristic specimens as — 
 c sparkling with splendour of imaginative genius, 
 and as odorous with the fragrance of exquisite 
 sensibility as though they had been strained 
 through starry strata and the musky loam of 
 Paradise.' The straining here is most unques- 
 tionable, though not precisely of the quality 
 premeditated ; but we take serious objection to 
 the filtering through c loam ' or slime, how- 
 ever 'musky,' and have no faith in 'starry 
 strata.' 
 
 Some poems are throughout so purely fanciful 
 that forms of treatment, otherwise objectionable, 
 are unhesitatingly accepted by every cultivated 
 mind as peculiarly judicious, tasteful, and beau- 
 tiful. For we must all admit that there is much 
 in every art which is ornamental without being 
 strictly adherent to Nature. But there is a 
 grand medium even in the use of ornament, 
 well expressed in the one word — Chaste. 
 There may be much difficulty in uniting the 
 chaste with the ornamental appertaining to 
 Nature, but therein lies its very excellency 
 when attained. Indeed there is but one step 
 from the gracefully ornamental to the absurdly 
 grotesque. 
 
 When the non-natural is adopted in any piece 
 employing imagination and fancy, there should 
 readily appear to be at least an approximate 
 connection. Whatever we find non-natural in 
 Shelley's Sensitive Flant (p. 148, 4,) is not 
 
THE NEGATIVE, MISUSED. 363 
 
 repellant to our common understandings, and we 
 are pleased with fanciful resemblances, and 
 cherish them as visions of fairy-land. 
 
 We accept without restraint the idea of the 
 flowers — 
 
 Who gaze on their eyes in the stream's recess, 
 Till they die of their own dear loveliness. 
 
 Nor have we occasion to feel grave doubts about 
 the hyacinth — 
 
 Which flung from its bells a sweet peal anew 
 Of music so delicate, soft, and intense, 
 It was felt like an odour within the sense ; 
 
 Nor to question respecting the rose whether — 
 
 The soul of her beauty and love lay bare. 
 
 The following example, however, from Ten- 
 nyson's Adelciine is far from being in accordance 
 with this view of the use of the non-natural 
 even in the lightest forms of poetry : — 
 
 Hast thou heard the butterflies 
 What they say betwixt their wings ? (p. 292, 8.) 
 
 This is neither tradition, fable, natural his- 
 tory, nor ever so remotely conceivable ; it is a 
 fiction without the slightest foundation ; it is 
 fantastical from its being without even a shadow 
 of possibility, and therefore partakes of the 
 character of a merely forced conceit, than which 
 nothing is more to be avoided in the exercise of 
 imagination and fancy. 
 
 Poets find negative views of Nature to be 
 available in a variety of compositions, as already 
 noticed, but particularly in Satire, Hyperbole, 
 and Bombast. It was, therefore, much employed 
 
364 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 by such poets as Shakspeare, Swift, Pope, Butler, 
 and Byron ; and by Rabelais, and other satirists 
 among the moderns. It also enters into numerous 
 proverbs, fables, and parables, both sacred and 
 profane. 
 
 In the typical employment of the negative or 
 non-natural strain, the sacred Scriptures afford 
 some remarkable examples from the poetry of 
 the Hebrews ; and it was impossible but that 
 such noble effusions should find many imitators 
 in modern songs, psalms, and hymns. But our 
 own great dramatist excels in many adaptations 
 of this style, appearing equally successful in 
 each ; as in The Tempest : — 
 
 The cloud-capt towers, the gorgeous palaces, 
 The solemn temples, the great globe itself, 
 Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve ; 
 And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, 
 Leave not a rack* behind : 
 
 Our arrangement of poetical specimens em- 
 ploying what we term The impossible, appears 
 to offer a strange subject for Nature-Study ; yet 
 we find that much skill and management is re- 
 quired to produce any similar novelty that shall 
 not verge on sheer bombastic composition. We 
 are introduced to counting drops of rain, pluck- 
 ing down a star, drinking the ocean dry, and the 
 like. But the same tone and style run through- 
 out the numerous subjects associated under the 
 general division of Negative and Non-natural 
 
 * According to Lord Bacon : ' The winds which move 
 the clouds above,' are designated the rack. 
 
THE IMPOSSIBLE. 365 
 
 views of Nature ; where Nature in all its in- 
 tegrity has to be carefully and faithfully studied, 
 to be, as here shown, inverted and misconstrued 
 for the purpose of producing intensified effect on 
 a reader's mind. 
 
( 3^ 
 
 Chapter XL 
 
 Miscellaneous observations ; peculiar applications of 
 Nature ; assimilating literary labours with external ap- 
 pearances in Nature ; religious appropriations of Nature ; 
 the unlovely or ugly ; amusing use of platitudes ; truth 
 and fiction in serious compositions ; climate and taste ; 
 concluding remarks. 
 
 A few miscellaneous observations may be very 
 usefully thrown together in reference to matters 
 that could not properly have been included in 
 the preceding classification. 
 
 In early poetry we sometimes meet with al- 
 lusions to Nature differing widely from modern 
 taste, and which are yet not too remotely con- 
 nected to attract our attention. The examples 
 we now present are from the Metrical Hymns 
 and Homilies of Epbraem Syrus, selected and 
 translated from the original Syriac by the Rev. 
 Henry Burgess, 1853. The on 'y pi ece we can 
 quote from is a homily entitled The Mystery of 
 the Trinity, its analogies in Nature, and their 
 explicableness. 
 
 Who hath ever accustomed 
 His mouth to the burning flame ? 
 Or his palate to fiery heat 
 Which never hath been tasted ? 
 
 Or,- 
 
 The sun passeth through a transparent vase 
 Into the midst of the water in it, 
 And generates in the cold element 
 The warmth of fire : 
 
METRICAL HYMNS, ETC. 367 
 
 the ray is not drowned, 
 
 Neither is the water divided ; 
 
 Or- 
 
 Gold is a single substance, 
 A flower is threefold ; 
 Stone is a single substance, 
 But fire is threefold ; 
 For flame, and heat, and light 
 Are mingled in it. 
 
 Or- 
 
 The clouds are more exalted 
 
 Than the vapours beneath them, 
 
 The heavens than both of them, 
 
 And the heaven of heavens is still higher. 
 
 The low mountains 
 
 Of this creation are high 
 
 To the dwellers in the dust beneath them. 
 
 Different to any other use of Nature than 
 the methods already discussed is that of taking 
 some broad feature of actual Nature, or its ap- 
 pearances or phenomena, to illustrate some mode 
 of human action. As when a poet finds in open 
 Nature such features as accord with some pe- 
 culiarities in his literary labours. Thus Drayton 
 invokes the Muse that : — 
 
 These things so in my song, I naturally may show ; 
 Now as the mountain high ; then as the valley low ; 
 Some easy passage raptured to translate, 
 My sole delight. 
 
 Referring to Allan Ramsay's Epistles, 1728, 
 there is one, remarks Campbell, addressed to the 
 poet Somerville. Professing to write from Na- 
 ture more than Art, he compares the rude style 
 which he loved and practised, to a neglected 
 orchard, which to him he confesses to be : — 
 
 a Paradise, 
 
 Compared to prime cut plats and nice, 
 
368 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Where Nature has to Art resigned, 
 And all looks stiff, mean, and confined.* 
 
 In like manner, Taylor, in his Notes from 
 Books, remarking on Wordsworth's style, says 
 that he does not claim for The Excursion — 
 
 A mantling and sparkling of poetic effervescence in every 
 page and line. In a poem upon so large a scale (he con- 
 siders) every genuine poet is aware that some parts should 
 be bordering upon prose, some absolutely prosaic. That 
 is, rise and fall, ebb and flow, light and shade, — moorland 
 and meadow and garden ground, — will be measured out in 
 due proportion by the author of a great poem. 
 
 Strange liberties are taken by well-meaning 
 writers who attempt the spiritualizing of Nature. 
 A quaint and elaborate instance will be found in 
 The Spiritual Use of an Orchard, or Garden of 
 Fruit Trees , by Ralph Austen, 1657, re P rm ted 
 1 847. At page 249, we read : — 
 
 The 50th observation in Nature. Some wild and un- 
 grafted trees bear fruits very like to those that are ingrafted 
 in shape and colour, so that men often mistake the one for 
 the other. 
 
 This shadows out to us this proposition, that the works of 
 formal hypocrites are (in many things) very like the works 
 of true Christians. 
 
 In the last chapter of his work, entitled Soul 
 in Nature, H. C. Oersted considers ' The un- 
 beautiful in Nature,' concluding with the obser- 
 vation, ' If he has comprehended the case 
 correctly, then Ugliness, as likewise, in a certain 
 sense, Evil, becomes a finite condition ; on the 
 other hand, that which is essentially Beautiful is 
 Eternal.' 
 
 Admitting the c essentially beautiful ' in Na- 
 ture, what, we would ask, is the c essentially ' 
 ugly ? To call the smallest of the Almighty's 
 
 * See page 136. 
 
UGLINESS. 369 
 
 works either deformed or ugly is strong lan- 
 guage, embodying a sentiment from which we 
 must entirely dissent. 
 
 If we admit the term ' ugly ' as relating to 
 whatever does not attain to our own standard of 
 the Beautiful, then, indeed, it has its use in a 
 confined circle of virtuosi. But in a world-wide 
 sense it is inappropriate. The students of Nature 
 and of science acknowledge no such phrase. 
 They find that not mankind alone, but all ani- 
 mate and inanimate creation is ' fearfully and 
 wonderfully made.' 
 
 By ugliness we can only mean whatever is 
 disagreeable and repulsive from its want of con- 
 formity to our individual tastes, the result of 
 education and early association. Had we never 
 seen a creature without arms or hands we might 
 have considered birds as ugly monsters ; or in 
 like manner had we never seen one without legs, 
 arms, hands, or feet, we might have thought 
 fish frightfully ugly ; whereas, having been ac- 
 customed to see such creatures, we should now 
 consider any reversing of these conditions as 
 furnishing examples of a lusus nature. It is a 
 vulgar notion that, having fixed our own es- 
 timate of the sublime and beautiful, we may 
 assign to certain objects in Nature the position of 
 being low and degraded, and to other objects the 
 distinctive character of being supremely ugly. 
 Those who adopt this opinion, do not reflect 
 that their assumed standard would require re- 
 adjusting under every changing clime, because, 
 so to speak, it would be the arbitrary standard 
 of fashion and not the reliahle standard of truth, 
 
 2 B 
 
37° NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 — that is, of truth to Nature, which satisfies 
 now, as it has from the Creation, people of 
 all countries and every clime. It may be dif- 
 ficult to conceive the abstract idea of beauty in 
 Nature, from its antagonism to our early ac- 
 quired tastes ; but speaking of Nature simply as 
 the work of Almighty power, we must conclude 
 that, the least of God's creatures far excels in 
 perfection, beauty of design, and adaptation of 
 parts to particular ends, the most exquisite pro- 
 ductions of Art. 
 
 The imperfection of Art is, so to speak, self- 
 confessed in the fact that it is obliged to select 
 from Nature for painting the most pleasing 
 scenery ; for sculpture the most perfect figures, 
 with graceful grouping of them ; for music the 
 most harmonious sounds ; and for poetry a 
 variety of expression by which to describe and 
 to paint in words that which affords delight 
 whether in human or in external nature. And 
 Art asserts as the privilege of Art, to declare that 
 it only seeks and employs the Beautiful in Nature, 
 and that all else is inappropriate, rude, ugly, or 
 abhorrent. That which may be inappropriate, 
 because unbeautiful, in Art, is not, therefore, to 
 be degraded and reckoned ugly in Nature, else 
 in the Antediluvian World Nature's entire system 
 was one of animal ugliness. 
 
 The impress of mind on poetical conceptions 
 and compositions is in nothing more remarkable 
 than in their evident climatic features. There 
 are characteristic differences between the poetical 
 productions of England, Scotland, Ireland, and 
 Wales, a nationality quite as obvious as the 
 
PLATITUDES. 37 1 
 
 respective dialects ; in like manner we find dis- 
 tinctive features in French, German, Russian, 
 and Oriental poetry ; solemn, grave, or gay, and 
 embodying sentiments and metaphors, the result 
 of popular feeling, national institutions, and 
 peculiarities of climate. 
 
 The next poetical specimen which we shall 
 give is amusing from its very platitudes, as 
 offered in a humorous song by Armand 
 Charlemagne,* with well-sustained gravity : — 
 
 Brothers, 'tis a happy age, 
 
 This good age in which we live ; 
 
 * * * 
 
 Bolder than Philoxenus, 
 
 Down the veil of truth I tear ; 
 
 Friends, my revelations hear. 
 
 Light sometimes from candles comes ; 
 
 Water serves our thirst to slake ; 
 Nipping cold our fingers numbs ; 
 
 Grapes are gathered in September ; 
 June is mostly very hot ; 
 
 Nought more cold than ice we know ; 
 
 * * * 
 
 Human pleasures come and go, 
 Mortals all must feel Time's sickle. 
 
 Not the Danube is the Oise ; 
 Neither is the day the night ; 
 
 If in summer you fell trees, 
 Ev'ry one can pick up leaves. 
 
 Crabs advance by going back. 
 
 * See The Illustrated Book of French Songs, translated 
 by J. Oxenford, 8vo, 1855. 
 
 2 B 2 
 
372 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 In your garden rhubarb plant, 
 And you'll find no turnips come. 
 
 * * * 
 
 * * * 
 From the head the feet are far, 
 
 On the neck the former stands. 
 
 * * # 
 
 * * * 
 Heavy rain will make us wet ; 
 
 Flints composed of stones are found 
 
 Woods of trees are sometimes full 
 Streams with fish will oft abound 
 
 Frogs are seen in many a pool. 
 At a rustle will the hare 
 
 Start, as 'twere a mighty shock ; 
 Moved by every breath of air 
 
 Is the fickle weathercock. 
 
 Learning is not common sense ; 
 
 Wisdom is a prize I hold : 
 
 * * 
 
 Every chatterbox may find 
 
 Deaf men are not wearied soon ; 
 
 'Tis peculiar to the blind 
 
 That they cannot see at noon. 
 
 How far the license traditionally accorded to 
 poetical writers may be safely carried in serious 
 pieces, is open to discussion. Thomson in his 
 Seasons cannot claim the same extent of licence 
 which in the Castle of Indolence is in keeping 
 with the nature of the poem. Therefore, 
 although it may appear to be hypercritical to 
 object to the subjoined passage, compensated as 
 it is by its beautiful conception and execution, 
 we may remark that without even the support 
 of the authority of fabulous histories, he 
 attributes the beauty of the diamond and other 
 gems to the sun's influence, thus : — 
 
NON-NATURAL. 373 
 
 The unfruitful rock itself, impregned by thee 
 In dark retirement forms the lucid stone. 
 
 The lively Diamond drinks thy purest rays. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 At thee the Ruby lights its deepening glow. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 From thee the Sapphire, solid ether, takes 
 
 Its hue cerulean. 
 
 The purple-streaming Amethyst is thine. 
 
 With thy own smile the yellow Topaz burns ; 
 
 Nor deeper verdure dyes the robe of Spring, 
 
 When first she gives it to the southern gale, 
 
 Than the green Emerald shows. 
 
 Thick through the whitening Opal plays thy beams. 
 
 The only apology for such plausible, but 
 unsupported interpretations of Nature, is their 
 decided originality, their daring, and their 
 presenting sufficient analogy not to offend our 
 common sense, or even our cultivated com- 
 prehension of the world around us, with its 
 varied products and appearances. 
 
 Every country gives evidence in its poetry of 
 
 some distinguishing feature. For example, no 
 
 English, French, or German poet would venture 
 
 to adopt the language of one of the most 
 
 popular songs of the Persian Turks, translated 
 
 as follows : — 
 
 One cannot gather pomegranates under the walls of a 
 fortress ; not everybody is bold enough to speak to that 
 beauty, so much like a green-headed duck. . . .* 
 
 We shall not pursue these investigations farther, 
 but proceed, in another chapter, to take a retro- 
 spective view of what has been advanced, and 
 to lay down the principle on which the facts 
 brought to light by the poetical examples we 
 have adduced are based, and show how the same 
 
 * Specimens of the Popular Poetry of Persia. By Alex. 
 Chodzko. 8vo. 1842. 
 
374 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 principle may be worked out and extended to a 
 degree not previously contemplated. We trust 
 it will be no occasion of disappointment to find 
 that the method, with its systematic appoint- 
 ment, is not one dependent on natural philosophy : 
 is not, in short, scientific ; but appeals directly 
 to the common sense of every citizen of the 
 world who has attained an average amount of 
 educational advantages. 
 
375 
 
 Chapter XII. 
 
 ^Esthetics must afford rules of Art ; Nature unerring, 
 creative, and perfect ; Art imperfect ; Nature a mystery ; 
 Beauty a trait of Nature ; Nature as studied for Poetry ; 
 retrospect of preceding observations ; mysticism cen- 
 sured ; purely Descriptive Poetry ; Science antagonistic 
 to Poetry ; Dramatic Poetry. Nature simple in De- 
 scription and etherealized through Imagination and 
 Fancy ; Generalization and Particularization illustrated ; 
 Nature in reference to human passions, sentiments, and 
 other associations; Shakspeare an eminent instance; a 
 Common-place Book suggested ; subjects for it. Con- 
 cluding remarks. 
 
 We have now, as succinctly as possible, to 
 adduce from this large digest of poetical materials 
 some practical method of Nature-Study. It 
 belongs to ^Esthetics to lay down rules of Art, 
 and the arts of Poetry and Eloquence cannot be 
 better served than by even the most humble 
 contribution to a system that aids, however 
 imperfectly, to interpret, as it were, the apoca- 
 lypse of Nature : of — 
 
 Unerring Nature ! still divinely bright, 
 One clear, unchanged, and universal light, 
 Life, force, and beauty, must to all impart, 
 At once the source, and end, and test, of Art. 
 
 While Nature is creative and perfect, Art is, 
 on the contrary, constructive and imperfect ; the 
 one is independent, and consequently original ; 
 the other dependent, a copyist and compounder 
 of portions of Nature's products. 
 
 From first to last Nature is one grand mystery ; 
 
376 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 and in a large and literal sense is indestructible, 
 because at best we can but change and vary 
 external forms and appearances. The sublimities 
 of Nature consist in a multitudinous association of 
 beauties. 
 
 In treating of Beauty we feel alive to the 
 limits of human language, for there is a beauty 
 which is wholly of Nature ; and another which 
 is wholly of Art ; and both essentially different ; 
 hence we have Nature-beauty and Art-beauty 
 independent the one of the other. 
 
 Mankind at large admire the beauties of 
 creation ; but nationalities of taste render it 
 impossible to fix a universal standard of beauty 
 in art in all its departments. 
 
 There is a transition state in Nature leading 
 to decay and ruin, but on a very small scale, 
 being, as compared to the vast universe, less 
 than c the dust in the balance.' This may be 
 considered by many to mitigate against Nature 
 being considered as wholly and unexceptionally 
 Beautiful. Fortunately it makes very little 
 difference whether we accept or reject the prin- 
 ciple that Nature is its own standard of Beauty, 
 a position due to its perfection, fitness, and 
 marvellous completeness in its smallest equally 
 with its most stupendous proportions ; with such 
 scrutineers it is, in Thomson's words : — 
 
 As if upon a full-proportioned dome, 
 On swelling columns heaved, the pride of art, 
 A critic fly, whose feeble ray scarce spreads 
 An inch around, with blind presumption bold, 
 Shall dare to tax the structure of the whole ! 
 
 We have already sufficiently pointed out that 
 there is a wide difference between the study of 
 
NATURE, SCIENCE, ETC. 377 
 
 Nature pursued for the purposes of Science, as 
 compared with the requirements of such a study 
 in Poetry. Coleridge has well observed that — 
 c Poetry is not the proper antithesis to prose, but 
 to science. Poetry is opposed to science, and 
 prose to metre. The proper and immediate 
 object of science is the acquirement, or com- 
 munication of truth : the proper and immediate 
 object of poetry is the communication of imme- 
 diate pleasure.'* 
 
 We have shown how remarkably Language, 
 whether real or as expressed in prose composi- 
 tions, is indebted to Nature ; and we find the 
 same thought, occurring in ancient and modern 
 proverbs and all descriptions of poetry. Hum- 
 boldt^ has very happily noticed that the 
 earnest and solemn thoughts awakened in us by a 
 communication with Nature intuitively arise from 
 a presentiment of the order and harmony per- 
 vading the whole universe, and from the contrast 
 we draw between the narrow limits of our own 
 experience and the image of infinity revealed on 
 every side, whether we look upwards to the 
 starry vault of heaven, scan the far-stretching 
 plain before us, or seek to trace the dim horizon 
 across the vast expanse of ocean. 
 
 And he farther remarks : All that the senses 
 can but imperfectly comprehend, all that is most 
 awful in romantic scenes of Nature, may become 
 a source of enjoyment to man, by opening a wide 
 field to the creative powers of his imagination. 
 
 * See The Literary Remains of S. T. Coleridge, 2 vols. 
 8vo. 1836. 
 
 f Cosmos, 1st vol. i2mo. 1849. 
 
3/8 N ATU RE-STUDY. 
 
 Impressions change with the varying movements 
 of the mind, and we are led by a happy illusion 
 to believe that we receive (direct and intuitively) 
 from the external world that with which we 
 have ourselves invested it. 
 
 Perhaps the poet will have no greater difficulty 
 to contend with than the laying aside of such 
 impressions, in studying Nature by any system 
 (methodized or not) other than a simple and 
 thorough acquaintance with Nature in its varying 
 aspects, characters, and material substances ; as 
 matters of fact and reality, open to examination 
 through the medium of intelligence and our 
 several senses. By intelligence we mean common 
 sense, which in every age acquires an improved 
 tone with the spread of education and general 
 civilization. Chaucer in the 14th century wrote 
 for a public not so refined as that addressed by 
 Spenser in the 1 6th century, and the public com- 
 mon sense was still more cultivated when ad- 
 dressed by Shakspeare in the 17th century. In 
 like manner the 1 9th century has risen in the scale 
 of intelligence to such a degree as to accept from 
 the poet with understanding, utterances which 
 might have been neither approved nor popular 
 four or five centuries back. Any study of 
 Nature, or any poetry claiming to be derived 
 from Nature, yet attempting to anticipate the 
 common intelligence of the age, will necessarily 
 be a failure. Hence the pretended mysticism of 
 all writers, past or present, is unnatural, false, 
 and untenable ; and as such has never obtained 
 any hold on the public mind. 
 
 Our 3rd and 4th chapters are sufficiently ex- 
 
epithets. 379 
 
 planatory of the extent to which the matters they 
 refer to are indebted to Nature, to excuse any 
 necessity for farther remarks. So far as they 
 immediately affect poetry and eloquence, they 
 may be useful in leading to the production of 
 appropriate and forcible epithets, on which sub- 
 ject Jermyn's treatise might be advantageously 
 consulted. He gives examples which seldom 
 occupy more than a line, or couplet, closely 
 printed ; yet under the word ' Cloud,' 1 1 pages 
 are occupied with suitable quotations ; in like 
 manner ' Smile' has 9 pages ; ' Moon' above 8 
 pages ; ' Hill' 7 ; * Kiss' above 6 ; and c Oak' 6 
 pages ; besides which are poetical epithets apply- 
 ing to Beard, Eagle, Gold, Ivy, Lightning, 
 Nightingale, Rill, Tiger, Violet, Xanthus, Yell, 
 and Zephyr.* 
 
 In Nature-Study the poet's true province 
 strictly begins with Descriptive Poetry, proceed- 
 ing thence to Human Nature, and the Moral, 
 Religious, Didactic, or Social and Political, 
 employing in all a greater or less degree of 
 Imagination and Fancy, proportioned to the re- 
 quirements of the subject, and the genius and 
 taste of the poet or orator to trace for our delight, 
 or instruction, or both, in happy conjunction — 
 
 Those lineaments of beauty which delight 
 The Mind Supreme. 
 
 If we consider purely Descriptive Poetry, it 
 cannot be too true to Nature in its word-painting ; 
 as exact a reflex as possible of the very objects 
 and scenes depicted. The effect on the hearer's 
 
 * See Book of English Epithets, literal and figurative. By 
 James Jermyn. Royal 8vo. 1849, 
 
380 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 or reader's mind should be that of an instan- 
 taneous conception of the characteristics described ; 
 and if referring to any familiar or known subject, 
 it should bring vividly to mind not only the 
 obvious, but the overlooked facts and beauties that 
 had escaped less observant minds. With the 
 wide world of Nature before him the poet must 
 not only select, copy, and faithfully portray what 
 he sees under chosen and favourable aspects, but 
 he must suggest the sensations it is calculated to 
 foster in other breasts than his own. One poet 
 may see gloom, and misery, and portents in all 
 around him, because his mental constitution is so 
 jaundiced as to view everything through a dis- 
 coloured and disordered medium. Lord Byron 
 was incapable of taking a generous view of 
 Human Nature ; and Dr. Newman sympathizes 
 only with the unreal, as in his ' Dream of 
 Gerontius.' Burns and Scott treat of Nature 
 with hearty hilarity ; while Wordsworth regarded 
 Nature as a divinity with whom he would fain 
 communicate, imbuing his very poetry with a 
 philosophical pantheism. Mere description of 
 external Nature, will, as a general rule, form but 
 an inconsiderable portion of any large work ; 
 but when it can be judiciously applied, the higher 
 the tone, the more graphic the outline, the 
 brighter the colouring, and the more striking the 
 general conception of the entire picture, the 
 greater will be the charm. Such illustrative 
 sketches afford relief and variety as well as add 
 beauty and vigour to any composition, however 
 grave or gay may be the subject. The 5th and 
 6th chapters, relating to descriptive poetry, show 
 
DESCRIPTION. 381 
 
 in the examples furnished, that generalisation 
 prevails throughout to an extent that leaves much 
 to the reader's imagination to amplify or diminish. 
 A reader deficient in imagination will therefore 
 often prefer a writer who thinks for him. Mr. 
 Dickens thinks for his readers to the extent of 
 giving the pattern of a neck-handkerchief, every 
 article of apparel, and furniture, and every 
 feature and action of his life-like characters. If 
 after viewing some interesting scene for the first 
 time, the observer were to close his eyes, and dic- 
 tate his impressions, he might give a good general 
 description of such a scene, but how much would 
 he leave out ! Descriptive poetry, like paint- 
 ings, will always have the impress of the artist's 
 peculiar handling of his subjects. And not only 
 so, but one poet soars among the stars, another 
 traverses mountains and dreary scenes, while a 
 third is all for flowers, or fields, or animal nature, 
 with various degrees of excellence in each depart- 
 ment. The poet can go little farther than to 
 arrive at exactness of description, confining him- 
 self to what the eye observes ; and any colouring 
 of imagination, or expression of sentiments in 
 connection with inanimate Nature, must depend 
 on his own intelligence. The student will have 
 sufficient occupation for his talents for a long 
 time, in attaining the ability ^ to realize pictures- 
 queness and truthfulness in depicting the objects 
 and phenomena presented to his daily observa- 
 tion, whether heavenward he views the Celestial, 
 or on earth that which is Terrestrial. But in no 
 instance can Science assist him more than in 
 affording him a good common education, suitable 
 
382 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 to his condition in life and the age in which he 
 lives, by which he will be enabled to speak cor- 
 rectly and reasonably about all matters on which 
 he desires to treat. He has more to do with the 
 exterior than the interior of matter ; he does not 
 profess to discuss natural facts with the minute 
 scientific accuracy of a natural philosopher. A 
 scientific poet would be as nearly as possible the 
 very antipodes of what he should be. Examples, 
 indeed, are not wanting of poets who stand isolated 
 in our literature. But such examples mostly indi- 
 cate rather what is to be avoided than what is to 
 be imitated. Sylvester might be named for 
 beauties as well as for bombast ; Fletcher for his 
 poetical anatomy of Man ; and Darwin for his 
 botanical exposition of the loves and properties 
 of plants. The student's only safe plan is to 
 make himself thoroughly acquainted with the 
 modes of description and selections made by 
 masters of the art, and then, without servilely 
 copying them, to adopt somewhat of their 
 system or method of depicting Nature, applying 
 their process to scenes and objects that have come 
 under his personal observation. Description has 
 been so extensively cultivated in prose and poetry 
 of late years that it does not afford much scope 
 for novel or peculiar modes of treatment ; and 
 perhaps, nothing §Jiort of an intuitive feeling 
 for, and love of Natural scenery, can assist the 
 few simple suggestions already offered for 
 practice. 
 
 Thus far we have considered description as 
 affecting the outer world in its animate and in- 
 animate conditions, but irrespective of the 
 
HUMAN NATURE. 383 
 
 human race. In the seventh chapter numerous 
 examples are given from eminent poets, arranged 
 under the heads of Physical, Metaphysical, 
 Ethical, Theological, Social, and Political. The 
 various modes here exhibited in treating of Man, 
 his intellectual faculties, moral obligations, future 
 destiny, social habits, and general government, 
 complete and abundant as they may appear, 
 afford but a glance at the study of Human 
 Nature. Dramatists and other poets when 
 engaged on this subject, find greater scope for 
 the exercise of imagination and fancy than in 
 any department we have previously noticed ; 
 and, as already remarked, it has engaged more 
 attention than either the inanimate or the brute 
 creation. The dramatist who would desire to 
 succeed in every line, from Tragedy to Comedy, 
 would have, in addition to natural ability for 
 such employment, to possess a large and varied 
 knowledge of his fellow creatures individually 
 and collectively, historically and personally, and 
 the more thorough his acquirements the greater 
 would be the probability of his success. As, 
 however, it would be impossible to enter on 
 extraneous matters, we are compelled to limit 
 our observations to the simple facts that present 
 themselves for consideration to a writer thus 
 inclined. His History will be limited to a 
 period, and not entitle him to be an historian ; 
 in Metaphysics he may indulge with the ardour 
 of a true philosopher; .but beyond these studies, 
 as a speciality, his general education, and his 
 intercourse with society, may be considered as 
 the sum of his mental requirements, so far as 
 
384 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 his study of Nature is concerned, about which 
 alone we are now treating. Whatever will assist 
 the poet in particular or general descriptions of 
 external Nature, will be equally serviceable to 
 him ; and last of all, having c a sound mind in a 
 healthy body,' he will find within himself a 
 pretty good standard by which to award to his 
 dramatis persona? a proper sphere for the display 
 of their good or evil qualities, their wisdom or 
 folly ; and every possible phase of prudence or 
 imprudence that marks the universal character 
 of his fellow Man. 
 
 We have thus endeavoured to impress on the 
 reader's mind that the Study of Nature as 
 affecting figurative language, proverbial sayings, 
 descriptive poetry applying to single objects, or 
 extended scenery, and lastly Human Nature 
 itself in all its complicated ramifications, is a 
 series of word-painted pictures, so plainly, 
 simply, and yet graphically and truthfully 
 drawn that they inform and instruct all minds, 
 but not all minds with equal intensity. We 
 thence infer that it is hopeless to refine on this 
 photographing process, considered in a literary 
 point of view ; and that no instruction can go 
 beyond recommending the same course of 
 delineation of the heavens, the earth, Man, and 
 all animate creation, as that which has been 
 found from the earliest to the present period of 
 our history to subserve all the purposes of 
 language in communicating our thoughts, 
 impressions, and sentiments in reference to our- 
 selves and the universe. 
 
 Nature, treated as a dry matter of fact is, as 
 
HUMAN NATURE. 385 
 
 it were, only so much either of living or dead 
 materials ; but in Man there is a soul, a mind, 
 intelligence, without which the grand features of 
 universal creation would be to him a blank ; and 
 day or night almost a matter of indifference so 
 long as he was housed, clothed, and fed. Savage 
 tribes of the human race offer a near approach 
 to this low scale of being. But in proportion 
 to his mental condition, so does Man become 
 more and more refined, and more sensible to the 
 grandeur, order, and beauty of surrounding 
 creation. And here, let it not be overlooked, 
 that it is a peculiar evidence of the poetic 
 temperament to possess in a larger degree than 
 ordinary, that mental faculty distinguished as 
 imagination and fancy, and to which he princi- 
 pally owes his pre-eminence in society. We 
 sufficiently express its noble and distinguishing 
 character under the somewhat objectionable term 
 — inspiration, which conveys to ordinary minds 
 the idea of supernatural interposition. Imagina- 
 tion and fancy are to poetry like those two great 
 lights, the sun and the moon, to our universal 
 parent — indispensable to its very existence. We 
 have seen that there may be much good, plain 
 descriptive poetry without much of the interpo- 
 sition of either ; and poetry, when referring to 
 Nature, is rarely spoken of otherwise than for 
 any excellence it may possess in description. It 
 never seems to have been ever so remotely 
 suspected, hitherto, that imagination and fancy 
 were capable of receiving any peculiar aid from 
 the study of external Nature. Whenever a 
 poem of an imaginative character is indebted to 
 
 2 c 
 
386 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Nature, then it is that the critic treats of Nature 
 as communing with the poet, and the poet as 
 looking into the very arcana of Nature, and 
 expounding the marvels of its most secret 
 recesses. This tone is never assumed in con- 
 sidering the most exquisite descriptive poem, 
 there the poet is the mere painter ; but let him 
 throw into his subject the entrancing excellence 
 of powerful imagination and glowing fancy, and 
 immediately his work is no longer of this earth 
 but spiritual ! No view of this interesting sub- 
 ject can be more untenable, or more likely to 
 discourage progress or improvement if believed 
 in, and attempted to be followed. 
 
 To assist the imagination and fancy in opera- 
 ting on the results of Nature-Study we must 
 first amass and arrange as systematically as 
 possible, the facts presented to our observation in 
 the material world ; and this leads us to refer to 
 our allusions at page 83, on the importance of 
 Generalization ; to which we may add as a 
 next process that of Particularization. To 
 show that this investigation has no direct 
 scientific bearing, we shall consider the universe 
 under the four ancient elements : — 
 
 The Earth may be considered a massy globe, constituted 
 of mountains, rocks, hills, plains, prairies, deserts, valleys, 
 shores, &c. ; each of which again has its distinctive 
 characters. Then come its living creatures — man, beasts, 
 birds, reptiles, and insects ; also trees, plants, vegetables, 
 fungi, &c. 
 
 Water may be noticed as next associated, consisting of 
 the ocean, rivers, bays, and lakes ; also rivulets, streams, 
 brooks, pools, &c; all supplied with salt, or fresh-water. 
 And rain, dew, mist, vapour, springs, cascades, &c, with 
 their living animal products of fish, &c, together with ac- 
 companying peculiar classes of vegetation. 
 
GENERALIZATION. 387 
 
 Air, as enveloping the whole, the firmament, with the 
 sun, moon, stars, and entire planetary system, and its 
 aurora borealis, rainbow, lightning, &c. Likewise con- 
 sidered as the supporter of animal and vegetable life. 
 And— 
 
 Fire, as evidenced by the sun's rays, volcanoes, friction 
 of wood, and combustion of wood, oil, &c. ; also phospho- 
 rences of the sea, fish, and the ignis fatuus. 
 
 Having thus obtained one form of synopsis 
 capable of considerable extension and more 
 precise arrangement, we may next turn to other 
 particulars, and generalize on matters connected 
 with the four elements. Thus : — 
 
 The Earth's objects are either animate or 
 inanimate. First, Animal and Vegetable king- 
 doms ; and second the Mineral kingdom. To 
 which may be super-added the Air and the 
 Water. These again branch out into subdivi- 
 sions, affording, in Man — life, with locomotion, 
 intellect and speech ; and in animals also — life 
 and locomotion, but with instinct only. Then 
 fish and other creatures, living wholly or partly 
 in water. And lastly, vegetable, or non-instinc- 
 tive life, without locomotion, whether land or 
 marine plants. 
 
 From the external we proceed to reflect on 
 the earth's internal construction ; its caverns and 
 underground seas, its animated creatures and 
 mineral products, its gems, its lava lakes, and 
 central molten mass. 
 
 The arrangement and classification of such 
 objects and phenomena as are ever present to our 
 senses throughout Nature, may be safely left to 
 ordinary skill and judgment, even while recom- 
 mending as desirable, the observance of attention 
 to Order, Genera, and Species. Scientific ex- 
 
 2 c 2 
 
388 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 actness however, will, as we proceed, appear to 
 be not necessarily called for in Nature-Study. 
 
 Having so far generalized on the subjects, 
 Earth, Water, Air, and Fire, we may take singly 
 any object or matter appertaining to them, and 
 still farther generalize on all or any of such 
 subjects. Thus : — 
 
 The Earth is present to our minds as a globe, 
 and so far like the sun, moon, and stars. Hence 
 we arrive at a general idea of rotundity in respect 
 to each, and of their rolling in circuitous paths. 
 And we farther arrive at ideas of Form or 
 Figure, whether in planets, man, animal, vege- 
 table, or mineral creation. 
 
 The planetary system leads us to reflect on 
 Day and Night, and thence to observe a similar 
 Duality throughout Nature, light and shade, 
 heat and cold, male and female, love and hatred, 
 good and evil, life and death. 
 
 We cannot consider the animal, vegetable, and 
 mineral kingdoms without being led to the ob- 
 servance of a wonderful Variety; animals and 
 plants differing in forms, colours, and con- 
 stitution ; not one animal but many ; nor 
 yet the same clothing, matter, or configura- 
 tion in them, or in any of Nature's multiform 
 products. 
 
 As we proceed in thus generalizing, if we 
 select the air, the sky, or water, and many other 
 works of Nature, we are at once struck with a 
 prevailing Simplicity, with attendant Beauty, 
 and at the same time with remarkable Grandeur. 
 Look where we will the observer of life sees 
 Vitality on the land and in the waters : with 
 
THE IMPONDERABLE. 38Q 
 
 Vitality of a different order in all kinds of vege- 
 tation. 
 
 The Earth, and the firmament, and entire 
 planetary system make known to us Power, and 
 Motion, and Solitude, and Time. 
 
 In the study of objects of external Nature we 
 deal generally with the ponderable ; but there is 
 another important class — the imponderable and 
 immaterial, as : — time, space, light, shadow, 
 colour, heat, cold, electricity, thunder, aurora 
 borealis, sound, echo, rainbow, &c. 
 
 In Nature-Study we have also to consider 
 certain states and conditions of matter, which 
 frequently are the unseen, or certainly unob- 
 served, characteristics in Nature, requiring a 
 peculiarly constituted mental vision, aided by 
 refinement of all our usual senses. It affords 
 such utterances as : — 
 
 In her hazel eyes her thoughts lay clear 
 As pebbles in a brook." 
 
 Or— 
 
 The night in her silence, 
 The stars in their calm.j 
 
 Although the foregoing arrangement of sub- 
 jects taken direct from surrounding natural 
 objects is to a certain extent arbitrary, we 
 must not use the same licence or freedom in the 
 style of our language. We may conduct our Na- 
 ture-Study without the intervention of any tech- 
 nical jargon, but at the same time we must main- 
 tain precise limits to our expressions, when simply 
 treating the study, as at present, in a grammar on 
 
 * Alexander Smith's Poems, 1853. 
 
 \ Matthew Arnold's New Poems. Empedocles on Etna. 
 
39° NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 the subject. We have pronounced against mix- 
 ing up any ideas of ' inspiration ' with the course 
 of our inquiry. We have spoken of c beauty ' as 
 inevitable in all the Almighty's works from their 
 very perfection, and from such decision there 
 should be no dissent, to accommodate any con- 
 ventionalities whatever. The reptile we should 
 abhor in our private apartments, has its fitting 
 place in creation ; therefore, any part of creation, 
 in relation to the universal system, is a marvel 
 and mystery, and as. such, beautiful beyond the 
 power of art to imitate. It is not then that we 
 require a reformed language in which to treat of 
 Nature, but simply a right understanding of the 
 limitation we put on our form of speech in ex- 
 pressing our views. 
 
 We may study Nature to enhance poetical 
 effusions with figurative language, and pleasing 
 scenes and objects ; or may take the inverse 
 course, and commencing with language seek in 
 Nature for some apt illustration. Thus the 
 P oet or Rhetorician, we will suppose, wishes to 
 illustrate, by finding images or figures bearing 
 comparison with — evanescence, decay, ignorance, 
 greatness, insignificance, distance, &c. But in 
 either way, the object of study must be indivi- 
 dually understood, and the better informed the 
 student is, the better will be the ultimate result 
 whether in poetry or eloquence. In how many 
 forms and after how many modes of application 
 have poets tuned the lyre to sing of evanescence, 
 of life, of pleasures, of time itself, as : — a breath, 
 flash, spark, shadow, cloud, dew, wave, falling 
 star, sun-beam, sound, ephemera, &c. ? The 
 
PARTICULARIZATION. 39 1 
 
 treatment of such subjects is pre-eminently within 
 the province of all poets; it may be ours to 
 suggest some undiscovered paths in their elysian 
 fields ! If we were to attempt seeking for scien- 
 tific information in impassioned verse we should 
 arrive at such interpretations as: — that water 
 retains no impressions ; that fish leave no track in 
 it ; that it is unsuitable for writing or painting ; 
 that snow melts in it ; that pebbles thrown in 
 cause circles on its surface ; that it takes the form 
 of the vase ; that it ascends in vapour, descends 
 in rain, or congeals to snow, or hail, or ice. And 
 so we might proceed, but instead, shall make it 
 evident that we see herein how completely 
 different is the poet's study of Nature from that 
 pursued by the scientific naturalist. 
 
 P articulari%ation, or analysis of any subject 
 appertaining to Nature, and forming any part or 
 portion of the matters belonging to a generalized 
 system, must follow in respect to each species of 
 such generalization. As, however, it would be 
 impossible within any reasonable limits to enlarge 
 on each topic of such an investigation, we shall 
 give only a few extended examples, as aids to the 
 reader's judgment : — 
 
 Variety surrounds us in prolific profusion ; the sun unlike 
 the moon or the stars ; animal life differing from vegetable 
 life, and vitality in the air from that in the water. The skin 
 of the human differing from that of the brute creation, and 
 their covering again from that of birds, insects, reptiles, 
 and fishes, and still greater in the vegetable world. Again, 
 the hairy coats of animals varying in texture and colour, 
 have no analogy to the varied plumage of birds, or the 
 scales of fishes or reptiles. There is a singular prodigality 
 in contexture, quality, and colour in each, and especially in 
 leaves, blossoms, and flowers of trees, shrubs, and plants ; 
 and likewise of fruits and seeds. 
 
39 2 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Even mankind, in a savage or civilized state, differs in 
 various countries, in stature, figure, physiognomy, com- 
 plexion, habits, feelings, and sentiments. The earth's 
 surface is varied with rocks, mountains, hills, dales, plains, 
 prairies, steppes, deserts, and wild tracts of country, varie- 
 gated with vegetation ; and watered by many mingling 
 sources, in endless variety of form and extent. 
 
 Man himself seeks to extend the bounds of this feature 
 in Nature, through continual efforts at variety in artistic 
 production, whether in his songs, music, games, hunting, 
 warfare, buildings, clothing, laws, or whatever he under- 
 takes. ... . 
 
 Suppose all Nature were reduc'd 
 To singleness in all its parts; 
 A single tree, and single plant ; 
 A single animal and bird ; 
 One insect of the beetle tribe ; 
 In water all the fish alike ; 
 The scene around, a gray imprint ; 
 How cheerless such a world would seem ! 
 Remarks. Man can only employ natural objects, or facts 
 relating to them that are within his own sphere of know- 
 ledge. An angel must be a winged human creature, and he 
 cannot conceive of any other form as more beautiful. 
 Although we consider transparency beautiful, we should 
 dread the sight of a transparent human form, even without 
 the wings. So long as our supernatural objects are suffi- 
 ciently human, we imagine they must of necessity be 
 beautiful and loveable. A griffin or a dragon, terrible as it is 
 meant to be, such monsters are no more than clumsy com- 
 pounds of existing features in natural objects, with no 
 variety in them beyond what they owe to uncouth combi- 
 nations of parts ; and distortions in their production. Now 
 in Nature there exists no creature living on the earth like a 
 fish ; or in the water any creature like man. There is no 
 bird in Nature like any flying insect ; or any quadruped that 
 is like a tree or flower. Human ingenuity cannot compete 
 in originality with Nature's amazing originality in its mar- 
 vellous Variety of products, whether they be animate or in- 
 animate. . 
 
 To change from this topic we will offer a few- 
 observations on Duality in Nature. When for 
 instance we particularize about ' light,' we have 
 next to take into consideration its counterpart 
 ' shade ;' in the same way c heat' would require 
 
DUALITY. 393 
 
 one mode of investigation, and c cold' another ; 
 so likewise would any physical or metaphysical 
 investigation. We shall find, for example, that : — 
 
 Light differs considerably according as it proceeds from 
 the sun, which is most diffusive, or the borrowed light of 
 the moon, or artificial light. But star-light, phosphores- 
 cence, the glow-worm, and red-hot substances, all glow too 
 faint and glimmering to be light-giving bodies. 
 
 A strong light has a blinding effect, unless above or 
 behind us. Artificial light intensifies surrounding dark- 
 ness. All light is permanent in the sun, moon, and 
 planets ; all else evanescent, as lightning, conflagrations, a 
 blaze, a flame, a spark, an ignis fatuus. 
 
 Light appears silvery, golden, red, or of other colours. 
 Passing through leaves it appears green, through rain-drops 
 or bubbles prismatic, as in the rainbow, whether in the 
 firmament, or the mere spray of a cataract. 
 
 The sun's light casts very slight shadows, the full moon 
 very dense shade. The stronger any artificial light, the 
 darker and more defined do the shadows appear. All light 
 projects the shadow beyond the object, thus we may see the 
 shade of a cloud before observing its existence, and so — 
 
 Coming events cast their shadows before. 
 
 And such shadows will always be black conical beams ; 
 thus in Cary's translation of Dante's Paradise, c. xxx. we 
 meet with — 
 
 Noon's fervid hour, perchance six thousand miles 
 From hence is distant ; and the shadowy cone 
 Almost to level on our earth declines ; 
 When — 
 
 In like manner Milton, in Paradise Lost^ 
 B. iv.— 
 
 Now had night measur'd her shadowy cone 
 Halfway up hill this vast sublunar vault. 
 
 Light may be seen without enlightening, as in the stars, 
 remote fire, phosphorescence, &c. Light may eclipse light, 
 as the sun the stars. Light passes through crystal, air, 
 water and transparent matters. But the profound depths 
 of the ocean are possibly a perpetual night. The slightest 
 opaque body interrupts the passage of light. 
 
 Where there is light there is attendant shade ; one re- 
 presents day, the other night. The sun can only enlighten 
 half the globe ; the moon borrows its light from the sun ; 
 
394 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 the earth is luminous to other planets, thus opaque sub- 
 stances may reflect light and appear phosphorescent, and 
 man, together with all created matter, may appear to other 
 planets as being all equally bright and glowing. 
 
 Light travels, occupies time, and may yet be in its course 
 to reach planets still unblest with light. We could not by 
 any effort see the inhabitants of such spheres, much less the 
 dark worlds they occupy ; but they, although in darkness, 
 could plainly see our system, and others, being luminous : 
 thus we cannot see those who are in the deep recesses of a 
 cavern, who may yet be able to perceive distinctly ali at its 
 entrance in the broad daylight. 
 
 Light has always attendant shade. Shadow is trans- 
 parent, we see through abeam of dense shade ; when falling 
 on grass, or trees, or whatever is green, it seems to render the 
 colour a darker green ; and so in like manner of any other 
 colour. But white becomes gray ; and black remain un- 
 affected — we cannot make black, blacker. No creature is 
 so small as to cast no shadow on the globe. 
 
 Duality presents itself under different circum- 
 stances. The solar system being perpetual light 
 cannot be imagined to be ever in shade or sub- 
 ject to the remotest appearance of night. Death 
 presumes previous life in material matter, animal 
 or vegetable ; except mineral and certain element- 
 ary bodies which we only know as inert and 
 formless, as a general rule, because some minerals 
 and salts are crystalline, &c. Duality may or 
 may not be negation, it may be mere difference, 
 as male and female. There is no duality, how- 
 ever, in respect to c time.' 
 
 Time comes stealing on by night and day. The 
 true elements constituting material and gaseous 
 matter are likewise without duality; and the 
 astral system is equally independent of any such 
 condition, so far as we have any power of 
 knowing. It may now form an interesting 
 variety in our examples to consider — 
 
 Mysteries in which Nature abounds, notwithstanding that 
 
MYSTERIES. 395 
 
 Nature's laboratory lies wide open to our severest scrutiny, 
 and is lavish in exposing its treasures for our search and use. 
 When we speak of any phenomenon in Nature as being a 
 mystery we do but in other words acknowledge our own 
 ignorance and insufficiency to account for the seed becom- 
 ing a tree, the tree putting forth buds, leaves, and blossoms, 
 and the blossoms becoming fruit suitable for oil, or wine, or 
 food, or supplying seed from whence may spring other trees. 
 We measure and count the stars ; we classify, describe, and 
 anatomize animals and plants ; and reduce ponderable and 
 aeriform matter to elementary forms, from which we can by 
 combination, aided by Nature's own unerring laws, afford a 
 synthetical proof of some previous analysis. J 
 
 But man's ability, even here, does not go beyond that of 
 the husbandman, who, having sown the seed, must leave 
 the result of the harvest for Nature to mature. 
 
 Astronomy relates to one vast system of mysteries, and 
 includes our own surprising earth, which to penetrate 
 would show its diameter to be nearly 8000 miles, but which 
 man has not penetrated above 3000 feet. Our satellite the 
 moon, another mystery, receiving and giving light, with 
 unchanging face. The surrounding vault of heaven, our 
 very atmosphere, alike in all climates, and at all elevations, 
 are marvels no less than all the sources of fresh, mineral, 
 and salt waters. Equally or more surprising are the almost 
 supernatural influences of electricity, as exhibited in the 
 atmosphere, loadstone, fish, and galvanism. 
 
 But not only the universe at large and all animate and 
 inanimate creation constituting our planet are a mystery to 
 the human mind, Man to himself is his own greatest 
 mystery. He learns something through the medium of 
 anatomy, metaphysics, ethics, and theology, and branches 
 out into many intellectual and physical pursuits, but he is 
 still ever only the more disposed to search for the Super- 
 natural ; his only choice is between that, and Nature itself. 
 He may often satisfy his individual mind with his combi- 
 nations of the two different pursuits ; but, should such 
 system of purely human invention outlive one age, its 
 fallacies will become apparent in some early succeeding 
 age. It is not, at present, given to man to be prophetic, 
 whatever may be his destiny in future ages. 
 
 Such subjects of investigation as, the constitu- 
 tion of our atmosphere, lightning, magnetism, 
 common electricity, the nature of minerals, the 
 composition of the diamond, the chemistry of 
 
39^ NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 agriculture, anatomy, medicine, the circulation of 
 the blood, with numerous others, were for a long 
 period matters of superstition, doubt, and vulgar 
 mystery. Superstitious opinions have fled, and 
 mankind is open to accept a more refined order 
 of mysteries, and all the more and better to rever- 
 ence a divine origin, as their only source. In- 
 vestigation into Nature, however minutely, ac- 
 curately, and successfully pursued, instead of 
 removing a single mystery leads only to the 
 discovery of mystery within mystery. Nature 
 is inscrutable, and so diversified and subtle that 
 we may with increase of knowledge enlarge but 
 can never hope to diminish the scale of its mys- 
 teries. The elements, or letters of its language 
 are threefold more than any human language, 
 and are capable of untold combinations passing 
 through incredibly delicate yet sensibly distinc- 
 tive characteristics. 
 
 The greatest and most interesting mystery is, 
 that of life — animal life and vegetable life, toge- 
 ther with the differences of their conditions. 
 Indeed not a single subject can be tabulated for 
 sketching its peculiar features, to which could 
 not be appended a long list of its most prominent 
 suggestions of Mystery. But how different is 
 Mystery as found in Nature, compared with that 
 false Mystery due to the creative ingenuity of 
 man's intelligence, in his idols, and monsters, 
 and fables. To be Mysterious as Nature is 
 Mysterious, would indeed be a prime merit in 
 Poetry and every Art ! 
 
 Our inquiry into Mysteries in Nature seems 
 rather to point to a warning of danger, than to 
 
SINGLE OBJECTS. 
 
 397 
 
 anything within man's feeble power of imitating ; 
 and yet it is of importance to the poet to learn all 
 he can possibly acquire, whether as something 
 occasionally to avoid, and at other times reve- 
 rently to follow as a guide, if not to imitate. 
 Perhaps the most useful synopsis of natural facts 
 might be tabulated from subjects of a less com- 
 plex character, such as have a comparatively 
 limited range, as Vegetation, or some selected 
 portion of such a topic. We will choose — 
 
 The Violet. In his Book of English Epithets^ 
 1 849, Jermyn has noticed among others the fol- 
 lowing epithets applied to this favourite flower 
 by different poets :— 
 
 Azure 
 
 Fragrant 
 
 Sad 
 
 Bashful 
 
 Glowing 
 
 Sapphire 
 
 Black 
 
 Hedge-row 
 
 Shadowy 
 
 Blue 
 
 Humble 
 
 Shy 
 
 Blue-eyed 
 
 Impurpled 
 
 Snow-clad 
 
 mantled 
 
 Leaf- veiled 
 
 Soft 
 
 veined 
 
 Lovesick 
 
 Solemn 
 
 Blushing 
 
 Lowly 
 
 Speckled 
 
 Breeze-scenting 
 
 Lurking 
 
 Thicket-loving 
 
 Creeping 
 
 Meek 
 
 Timid 
 
 Dainty 
 
 Modest 
 
 Tufted 
 
 Dark-eyed 
 
 Moist 
 
 Various 
 
 Deep-dyed 
 
 Moss-couched 
 
 Velvet 
 
 Dejected 
 
 Much-loved . 
 
 Vernal 
 
 Drooping 
 
 Nodding 
 
 Virgin 
 
 Dusky 
 
 Odorous 
 
 Unsunned 
 
 Early 
 
 Pale 
 
 Way-side 
 
 Fair 
 
 Pensive 
 
 White 
 
 Folded 
 
 Purple 
 
 Woodland 
 
 Fountain 
 
 Sable 
 
 
 These and far more might be selected to dis- 
 tinguish this peculiarly-favoured flower — 
 
 Violets dim, sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes. 
 
 Or, as Bowring sings — 
 
39$ NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 Sweet flower ! Spring's earliest loveliest gem ! 
 
 well may Nature's Poet love thee ! 
 
 There is, however, a wild violet, the Dog's 
 violet, destitute of smell — 
 
 Thus Virtue's garb Hypocrisy may wear. 
 
 When we generalize we speak of flowers, when 
 we particularize we treat of the rose, violet, 
 lily, primrose, jasmine, &c. When 'Flowers' 
 are the subject, we note many facts common to 
 the violet or any other flower. We might par- 
 ticularly remark that it was common to all to be 
 short-lived, varied in colour, form, and size, with 
 or without odour, cultivated or wild, blooming 
 in our own or a tropical climate ; some the most 
 common yet most pleasing ; distinctions between 
 flowers and blossoms, the latter producing fruits ; 
 and so forth. The vegetable kingdom would 
 open out a still larger field, and we should observe 
 generally particular kinds of vegetation, as : 
 trees, shrubs, creepers, plants, vegetables, roots, 
 &c. Then would follow particular kinds of 
 trees, of shrubs, &c, with an enumeration of 
 their seasons, characters, appearances, and other 
 distinguishing circumstances. 
 
 The application of this simple preliminary 
 process appears to be so obvious when once 
 adverted to and succinctly pointed out as to 
 require no more precise rules for its adoption 
 than have already been offered. But one re- 
 commendation we must give, and that is, for 
 every student of Nature to work out such pro- 
 cesses as these for himself, and not to rest 
 satisfied with the ready-written lessons of 
 
VARIED STUDY. 399 
 
 others ; for the very effort is in itself an absolute 
 advantage, which no force of memory acted on 
 by reading alone can adequately supply. Let 
 him produce his own common-place book of 
 observations, the fruit of various reading and 
 observation, and he will soon accustom his mind 
 to see farther into Nature than by larger draughts 
 obtained at second-hand sources. 
 
 So far this process of Nature-Study may 
 assist in suggesting judicious and forcible epithets, 
 and bold, beautiful, and graphic descriptions of 
 natural objects and scenery. But we must in- 
 vert this order when applying our efforts in 
 Nature-Study to assist our Imagination and 
 Fancy. Then we no longer Generalize in re- 
 spect to objects in Nature, but adopt the tech- 
 nology of Metaphysics, Ethics, Social life, and 
 other matters, and from them proceed to seek in 
 Nature for suitable illustrations to enforce our 
 discourse, whatever that may be, whether in 
 oratory, or in poetry, or general literature. On 
 these topics abundant selections from eminent 
 authorities can be referred to in the eighth chapter, 
 of Meditative, and other pieces; and the ninth 
 chapter, especially devoted to Imagination and 
 Fancy. If we select c Deity' — then the point is 
 to seek out the sublimities of Nature and com- 
 press them in the language of Apostrophe. 
 Much in the same way would it be were it the 
 object of the poet to treat of ' the Soul.' If 
 ' man, woman, parents, family, child, life, death,' 
 &c, were the leading topics, then for each would 
 be found some corresponding feature in Nature. 
 Whatever interests man in his social condition 
 
4-00 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 would in the same way find expression in some 
 appropriate imagery suggested by apparently 
 suitable natural objects or phenomena. 
 
 Many examples are afforded by proverbs, 
 and by the language of the Scriptures of 
 associations between our mental faculties and the 
 material world, thus, in Job : — 
 
 i. The wicked — are as stubble, (page 227, 1.) 
 
 2. The wicked man [as the] unripe grape. (231, 3.) 
 
 In the Psalms : — 
 
 1. The wicked [are] — like chaff. (227, 2.) 
 
 2. The godly man — like a tree planted by the rivers of 
 
 waters. ( 2 3°> 9 ) 
 
 3. The righteous shall flourish like the palm. (231, 2.) 
 
 Shakspeare's dramas abound in similar associa- 
 tions, for example : — 
 
 1. As small a drop of pity as a wren's eye. (p. 214, 1.) 
 
 2. Knowledge the wing wherewith we fly to heaven. 
 
 (2?2, 4.) 
 
 3. beauty 
 
 Whose action is no stronger than a. flower. (226. 4. } 
 4. mercy 
 
 It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven. 
 (229, 8.) 
 
 5. Glory like a circle in the water. (229,, 9.) 
 
 6. my hopes lie drowned, 
 
 many fathoms deep. (229, 1.) 
 
 7. What's in a name ? That which we call a rost , 
 
 By any other name, would smell as sweet. (232, 9.) 
 
 8. Sorrow breaks seasons, and reposing hours. (240, 7.) 
 
 9. chaste as the icicle. (241, 3.) 
 
 Dante also, as rendered in Cary's translation, 
 has : — 
 
 1. Life the tea/ that bows its lithe top. (p. 216, 1.) 
 
 2. Whom love did melt, as sun the mist. (226, 6.) 
 
 Ben Jonson says, allusive to — 
 
 1. Courtship — 
 
 Follow a shadow, it still flies you ; 
 Seem to fly, it will pursue. 
 
ASSOCIATIONS. 40I 
 
 Milton reminds us that : — 
 
 1. Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil. (p. 222, 5.) 
 
 Armstrong in The Dispensary^ observes : — 
 
 1. What does not fade ? 
 
 This huge rotundity where tread grows old ; 
 And all those worlds that roll around the sun, 
 The sun himself, shall die. (249, 6.) 
 
 Sir Walter Scott remarks : — 
 
 1. Thoughts- 
 
 Glance quick as lightning through the heart 
 (237, 3-) 
 
 And Moore :— 
 
 i. Thoughts come, as pure as light. (237, 5.) 
 
 Similar examples will be found interspersed 
 throughout the selections already supplied, in 
 which the foregoing can be referred to by the 
 pages and numbers annexed to each. The well- 
 read poet will not have failed to remark that, a 
 large stock of such figurative language has ac- 
 cumulated without much variety being produced, 
 beyond differences in application, so that some 
 figure happening to become a favourite has often 
 had the benefit of modifications in its employ- 
 ment beyond what has occurred with others of 
 less note. This appears to the author to be so 
 exactly and truly the case that he imagines were 
 it possible to find such a case as that of 
 a reader perusing a large collection of poetical 
 works, to the exclusion of those of Shakspeare, 
 he would on the first reading of the immortal 
 dramatist be struck with a difference in this 
 respect, for which he might not be able to 
 account, except so far as to describe it as some- 
 thing singularly original in its effect; for he 
 
 2 D 
 
402 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 wrote as never poet wrote before, so independent 
 and yet so forcible in expressing all manner of 
 feelings and sentiments. Now we believe that 
 this peculiarity is in a great measure due to that 
 poet's natural mental ability in first generalizing, 
 and thence particularizing or analyzing each sub- 
 ject, specially and separately. He would thus 
 have before him a train of thought leading to 
 results, many of which would be novel. At all 
 events, the construction of his language renders 
 it probable that his mode of procedure was some- 
 what analogous to that suggested. Let the 
 student of Nature, then, provided with a 
 Common-place book, as recommended, record, 
 not as Dr. Southey did, (see page 72), heteroge- 
 neous remarks on the sky, vegetation, animals, 
 and birds, just as circumstances might draw at- 
 tention to them ; but endeavour, under different 
 headings, to produce an exhaustive syllabus, or 
 analysis of each proposed subject. For the 
 present purpose he might begin by devoting one 
 or more pages to : — Speed, Evanescense, Decay, 
 Strength, Lasting, Perfection, Life, Death, 
 Height, Depth, Figure, Weight, Growth (man, 
 animal and vegetable), or the Senses, &c. Thus — 
 
 Speed, as observed in the heavenly system, is quite 
 beyond human comprehension ; on earth it is notable in 
 great rivers and cataracts ; in the progress of conflagra- 
 tions, in light, lightning, and electricity. In the progress 
 of wild animals, birds, fish, &c. But not so in the growth 
 of any living thing. Time moves slow but sure, from 
 infancy to manhood, from year to year, century to century. 
 
 Evanescence is suggested by the decline of day, the 
 perishable nature of beauty, the shortness of life, the fleet- 
 ing cloud, the morning dew, the early mist, the summer 
 shower, the April sun, flash of light, insect life, the fading 
 of flowers, &c. 
 
DECAY, &C 403 
 
 Decay, as evinced in man, brutes, and vegetable creation ; 
 life resists decay, but it follows on the heels of death. It is 
 a transitionary state, leading to other products and growths. 
 It crumbles down rocks, attacks the feeble and the strong, 
 and yet has its bounds. 
 
 Strength of material, of sense, of mind, or with the 
 meaning of power to resist. Man may have the strength 
 of a giant, in animals there is that of the elephant, in trees 
 the oak, in metals iron, among stones flint. There is the 
 strength of a number of men, or animals, even of rushes 
 as a bundle of rushes. The power to hold together is 
 exemplified by the law of gravity, cohesive affinity. Weak- 
 ness may display strength to overcome obstacles, as the 
 placid air roused to a hurricane ; the ocean, in a storm ; or 
 a spark of fire blown to a considerable flame. The 
 strongest wood is made up of silken fibres ; the hardest 
 marble of pearly and almost atomic grains. 
 
 Lasting, or undecaying, is seen in the sun, and all 
 heavenly bodies, the air we breathe, the waters in and 
 around the earth, and the earth itself. Transition or 
 change there will be, but the aggregate of matter remains 
 the same. Time is everlasting, so are day and night ; so 
 are light, heat, and electricity, as they only alter in degree 
 or change their abode. The fire that destroys leaves 
 imperishable ashes. Not an atom of matter is perishable, 
 it only alters its atomic constitution. 
 
 Perfection as exemplified throughout the mighty and the 
 minutest works of the Creator. Heavenly or mundane 
 bodies all alike so complete and perfect that we are cogni- 
 zant of no newly created or modified matter; no new matter 
 or being brought into existence, although many animals and 
 vegetables have evidently died out and been dispensed 
 with. A microscopic eye realizes the wonders of a truly 
 invisible world, the least as perfect in organization as the 
 most powerful and vigorous within daily observation. 
 
 These examples, imperfect as they are, will 
 suffice to show distinctly what is meant by our 
 proposal to seek in Nature for illustrations of any 
 subjects akin to those here outlined. In draw- 
 ing up such summary observations, the cir- 
 cumstance of our making some exceptional 
 observations is of less importance than to have 
 collected the greatest possible connected variety, 
 
 2 d 2 
 
404 NATURE-STUDY. 
 
 briefly expressed. And if revised from time to time, 
 that very exercise will prove of the utmost benefit 
 to the careful student. Such sketches are not to 
 be taken as confessions of faith, but as momen- 
 tary impressions, set down for future government 
 and hints. If while composing these analy- 
 tical programmes on any subjects, some special 
 application should suggest itself, it should be at 
 once interlined or transferred as a marginal note ; 
 for such will certainly happen in the process of 
 study we have indicated, a process which reading 
 and experience will contribute to render of 
 still greater importance. 
 
 As one result of a habit of this nature, ideas 
 will occur apparently unsought for, or as some 
 would prefer to say, from inspiration, but, as we 
 believe, from the habitual practice of looking 
 from poetry up to Nature as its undoubted 
 fountain ; and new ideas, when they arise, 
 should be at once recorded under appropriate 
 headings in the student's Common-place book. 
 
 Whether we examine Nature, commencing 
 with Material Objects, or whether we examine 
 it to find illustrations for Metaphysical, Physical, 
 Moral, or Religious truths, and look from them 
 to find in Nature apt associations with each, the 
 result attained will be the same ; that is, such an 
 acquaintance with Nature as has never hitherto 
 been obtained when the same object has been 
 followed in a desultory way, with only occa- 
 sional and remote favourable results. Whatever 
 the world may appear to beings differently 
 organized to ourselves, of this we feel certain, 
 that in our present state of existence we can 
 
CONCLUSION. 405 
 
 only consistently view matter as material, and 
 not as a spiritual essence. We are of the world, 
 earthy, and to the earth man is destined to return ; 
 and the soul, spirit, or mind of man can no more 
 commune with dead matter than with the dead 
 bones of his fellow man. It is given to him, 
 however, according to his genius and intellectual 
 capacity, so to associate himself with the lifeless 
 and living products of Nature, as to acquire an 
 intense, an enthusiastic admiration of Nature in 
 every possible phase of its character. But such 
 association is akin, although of a higher and 
 more estimable standard, to that of the anti- 
 quarian searching the ruins of Greece or Rome ; 
 or the Bibliomaniac among his black-letter 
 tomes ; or the Naturalist, or Geologist, or the 
 Chemist, absorbed in the study of an insect, a 
 petrification, or the composition of some natural 
 substance. That mind may be said to act thus in 
 giving as it were absolute spiritual existence to ex- 
 ternal Nature, is not to be perverted into a reality, 
 sought for as a reality, and appealed to as a very 
 deity. Whatever may be the mystery of Nature 
 in this respect, it is not (at present at least) given 
 to human intellect to penetrate ; and meanwhile 
 we must be content to follow our Nature- Study 
 humbly, sincerely, faithfully, and energetically ; 
 and then most assuredly our labour will not be 
 in vain. 
 
INDEX, 
 
 Aitkin, Dr. Essay on the Application of Natural History 
 to Poetry, 15, 16, 17 ; on Thomson's Seasons, 16. 
 
 Alison, Sir Archibald. On the changes of nature, 212. 
 
 Ampiere. On Homer, 153. 
 
 Analysis of proverbs, 110-11. 
 
 Analysis, or particularization of natural objects, 386. 
 
 Austen's spiritual use of an orchard, 368. 
 
 Arnold, Professor. Essays on Criticism. The interpretory 
 power of poetry, 26, 27 ; remarks on his argument, 28, 
 29, and 38. 
 
 Bain, Professor. Artistic and scientific truth, 259 ; com- 
 parisons employed in literary art for ornament and effect, 
 &c, 42-44. 
 
 Beattie. Praise of Nature, 46. 
 
 Blackmore, Sir Richard. The Creation, 154-5. 
 
 Bowles, Rev. W. L. The requirements of the true poet, 61. 
 
 Bowles, Byron, and others, controversy between, on the 
 former's critique on Pope, 11, 12. 
 
 Bowring's, Sir John. Batavian Anthology, 282, 332. 
 
 Cheskian Anthology (Bohemia), 303. 
 
 Magyar Poems, 191, 195, 203, 296, 316, 354. 
 
 Poetical Literature of Bohemia, 214. 
 
 Poetry, &c, of Spain, 123, 214, 227, 237, 274, 
 
 2 9 6 > 2 97> 3 2 3> 3 26 - 
 
 Russian Poets, 117, 129, 191, 224, 225, 264, 
 
 3 28 > 35 6 - 
 
 Boyle, Hon. R. Essay on Nature, 56. 
 
 Bright, John. The talk needful in settling great ques- 
 tions, 213. 
 
 Brown, Dr. On imagination, 258. 
 
 Bryant. On the love of Nature, 33. 
 
 Burns. On Nature, 47 ; Feeling for Nature, 157-8. 
 
 Byron. On Nature, 47. 
 
 Campbell. Nature the poet's goddess, 53, 54. 
 Carlyle. His use of figurative language, 89. 
 Charlemagne, Armand. Platitudes, examples of, 371-2. 
 
408 INDEX. 
 
 Coleridge. Biographia Literaria on the Imagery of the 
 Italian poets. Genius essential to the most perfect 
 interpretation of Nature, 41-2; imitation of Nature, 61; 
 on the summit of Etna, 212; poetry opposed to science, 
 377-8. 
 
 Darwin's (Dr. C.) Botanic Garden, 155-6-7. 
 
 De Quincey. Criticism on Wordsworth, 62-64. 
 
 Decay, 402. 
 
 As applied to single objects and features, 1 12-152. 
 Examples from — 
 
 Brooke, Henry, Universal Beauty, 113; Drayton, 
 113 ; Pope, 114. 
 Celestial Objects. — 
 Autumn. — 
 
 Keats, Arnold, Scott, 125; Scott, 126. 
 Clouds. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Shelley, Wordsworth, 127. 
 Evening. — 
 
 Cary's Dante, 1 18-19. 
 Morning. — 
 
 Wordsworth, Gray, Milton, Cary's Dante, 118. 
 Night.— 
 
 Cary's Dante, Creech's Lucretius, Lord Derby's 
 Homer, 119; Countess of Winchelsea, 119-20. 
 Young, Shelley, Scott, 121. 
 Rainbow. — 
 
 Shelley, Campbell, 128. 
 Sound. — 
 
 Shelley, Scott, 127. 
 Summer. — 
 
 Bell's Early Ballads, Bowring's Poetry of Spain, 
 123 ; Keats, Wordsworth, Thomson, Keble, 
 124. 
 Sun. — 
 
 Lord Derby's Homer, 116; Creech's Lucretius, 
 116-17; Cary's Dante, Sylvester's Du Bartas, 
 Bowring's Russian Poets, 117 ; Wordsworth, 
 117-18. 
 Spring. — 
 
 Creech's Lucretius, Earl of Surrey, Shakspeare, 
 Anna Seward, 122 ; Moore, Arnold, 123. 
 Thunder. — 
 
 Shelley, Scott, 128. 
 Winter. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Philips, Burns, 126. 
 
INDEX. 409 
 
 Terrestrial. — 
 Animalcules. — 
 
 Thomson, 145. 
 Animal Creation. — 
 
 Cowper, 137-8; Scott, 138; Montgomery, 138-9. 
 Bittern. — 
 
 Keats, 142. 
 Black-cock. — 
 
 Scott, 142. 
 Bowers. — 
 
 Dryden, 135; Warton, 135-6; Milton, Scott, 136. 
 Cuckoo. — 
 
 Logan, Wordsworth, 141. 
 Corn Crake. — 
 
 Leyden, 141. 
 Fish. — 
 
 Pope, 142 ; Smollet, 142-3. 
 Forest Fire. — 
 
 Leyden, 137. 
 Frogs. — 
 
 Cary's Dante, Dyer, 143. 
 Garden. — 
 
 Allan Ramsay, 136; Wordsworth, 136-7; Tennyson, 
 
 137- 
 
 Husbandry. — 
 
 Schiller (Lambert), 137. 
 Insects. — 
 
 Crabbe, 143. 
 Island. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 129-30. 
 Linnet. — 
 
 Wordsworth, 141-2. 
 Mountains. — 
 
 Cary's Dante, Milton, 131; Thomson, 131-2; 
 Burns, Coleridge, Shelley, 132 ; Scott, 132-3. 
 Nautilus. — 
 
 Coleridge, 143. 
 Petrel.— 
 
 Barry Cornwall, 140. 
 Pigeons. — 
 
 Cary's Dante, 139. 
 Reptiles and Insects. — 
 
 Brooke's Universal Beauty, 144. 
 Rivers. — 
 
 Addison, 133; Pope, Cowper, Burns, 134; Scott, 
 134-5 '■> Longfellow, 136, 
 
41 INDEX. 
 
 Rocks and Caves. — 
 
 Scott, 133. 
 Scenery. — 
 
 Dyer, 128-9 ; Bowring's Russian Poets, Shelley, 
 Scott, 129. 
 Sea Coast. — 
 
 Crabbe, Shakspeare, Arnold, 130. 
 Skylark. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Gray, 139; Shelley, 139-40; Words- 
 worth, Keats, 140, 
 Starlings. — 
 
 Cary's Dante, 139. 
 Swan. — 
 
 Wordsworth, 142.* 
 Thrush. — 
 
 Burns, 140. 
 Wastes. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Wordsworth, 131. 
 
 Vegetable Creation. — 
 Ash.— 
 
 Wordsworth, 146. 
 Beech. — 
 
 Campbell, 146. 
 Celandine. — 
 
 Wordsworth, 149. 
 Daisy. — 
 
 Wordsworth, 149-50 : Arnold, 150. 
 Flowers. — 
 
 Shelley, 148-9 ; Campbell, Wordsworth, 149. 
 Gorse. — 
 
 Cowper, 147. 
 Ivy. — 
 
 Dyer, 147. 
 Rose. — 
 
 Wordsworth, 147 ; Arnold, 147-8 ; Shakspeare, 
 148. 
 Sweet Briar. — 
 
 Moir, 146-7. 
 Violet. — 
 
 Wordsworth, 149. 
 Wood, &*c. — 
 
 Cary's Dante, Scott, Dyer, 145 ; Longfellow, 145-6 ; 
 From the German, 146. 
 
 * Erroneously attributed to Shelley in the text, 
 
INDEX. 411 
 
 DESCRIPTIVE POETRY. 
 Compound Objects, 153-174. 
 A calm Scene. — 
 
 Falconer, 164-5. 
 A Woody Dell.— 
 Shelley, 163-4. 
 Autumn. — 
 
 Thomson, 169-70. 
 Etna. — 
 
 Arnold, 162-3. 
 Evening. — 
 
 Gray, 171-2. Miss Aitken, 172 ; Dulcken, 172-3 ; 
 Scott, 165-6. 
 Hazy Scene. — 
 
 Wordsworth, 163. 
 Study. — 
 
 Goldsmith, 161-2. 
 Lake Scene. — 
 Scott, 166. 
 Mountain Scenery. — 
 
 Milton, 158-9. Ruskin, 159-61. 
 Moorland. — 
 
 Tennyson, 167. 
 Naples. — 
 
 Shelley, 161. 
 Rustic Scene. — 
 
 Tennyson, 166-7. 
 Spring Morning. — - 
 
 Dulcken, 168. 
 Sterile Scene. — 
 
 Tennyson, 167. 
 Summer. — 
 
 Thomson, 169. 
 Winter. — 
 Thomson, 170-1 ; Dryden, 171. 
 Du Bartas. Nature compared to a Book, 32. 
 Duality, 394. 
 
 Dickens, his use of Figurative Language, 89, 90. 
 Early English Poetry, its imperfect treatment o 
 
 Scenery, 5. 
 Edinburgh Review, The. Poetical Reality or Truth to 
 
 Nature, 60. 
 Emerson on the Study of Nature, 33. Greatness and 
 
 Grandeur of Nature, 38. 
 Epic Poets, and the world of Nature, 5. 
 Epithets, 379. 
 Esthetics must offend rules of Art, 375-405. 
 
412 INDEX. 
 
 Evanescence, 402. 
 
 Fables, 350-1. 
 
 Fancy and Imaginative, 260-1. 
 
 Figurative Language, 87, 97. Examples from Macaulay. 
 
 88 ; Carlyle, 89 ; Dickens, 89, 90 ; Gladstone, 91, 92. 
 Fletcher, Phineas. The Purple Islands, &c, 210. 
 Generalization, 387-8. 
 
 Gladstone, his use of Figurative Language, 91. 
 Goethe, on the separation of Subject from Object, 14 ; on 
 
 man in his relation to Nature, 6. 
 Herder, on Hebrew Poetry, 211. 
 Horace's Art of Poetry, 3. 
 
 HUMAN NATURE, THE POETRY OF, 175-210. 
 
 Ethical. — 
 Age.— 
 
 Bowring's Russian Poets, 191-2. 
 Ambition. — 
 
 Byron, Longfellow, 190-1 ; Ben Jonson, 191. 
 Beauty. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 190. 
 Coward. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Coleridge, 190. 
 Death.— 
 
 Raverty's Afghan Poetry, Shelley, 192. 
 Flattery. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 189. 
 Generous Nature. — 
 
 Spenser, 1S7. 
 Good or Evil Fortune. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 190. 
 Idleness. — 
 
 Young, Thomson, 189. 
 Ingratitude. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 188. 
 Life. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 187 ; Bowring's Magyar Poems, 191. 
 Nature's Lessons. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 188-9. 
 Pride. — 
 
 Chapman, 188. 
 Ruin. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Young, 190. 
 Slander. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 189. 
 Virtues. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 18S. 
 
INDEX. 413 
 
 Metaphysical. — 
 Frail Beauty. — 
 
 Earl of Surrey, 185-6, 
 Matchless Beauty. — 
 
 Scott, 186. 
 Genius. — 
 
 Akenside, 183. 
 Liberty. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 187. 
 Love. — 
 
 Thomson's Sales Attici, 184-5 > Harrington, Chap- 
 man, Shakspeare, 185. 
 Man and Nature. — 
 
 Byron, 183-4. 
 Melancholy. — 
 
 Beaumont and Fletcher, 186. 
 Mind, &c. 
 
 Kennedy's Poets of Spain, Young, 182 ; Brooke, 183. 
 Passions. — 
 
 Thomson's Sales Attici, 184. 
 Time. — 
 
 Thomson's Sales Attici, 187. 
 Physical. — 
 Baby.— 
 
 Thomson's Sales Attici, 177. 
 Brows. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 178. 
 Death. — 
 
 Shelley, 181-2 ; Shakspeare, 182. 
 Eyes. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 178. 
 Human Frame. — 
 
 Garth, 180-1. 
 Life. — 
 
 Campbell, 181. 
 Man. — 
 
 Thomson's Sales Attici, 176-7 ; Shakspeare, 177. 
 Old Age, &>c. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Scott, 180. 
 Our Lives. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 179 ; Keats, Scott, 180. 
 
 Sleep.— 
 
 Sir Philip Sidney, Shakspeare, Scott, 178 ; Young, 
 Wordsworth, 179. 
 Smiles. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Shelley, 178. 
 
4*4 INDEX. 
 
 Woman. — 
 
 Thomson's Sales Attici, 177. 
 Political. — 
 A Mob.— 
 
 Shakspeare, 209. 
 Checks. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 209. 
 Civil War. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 206-7-8. 
 Fitz -James. — 
 
 Scott, 208. 
 King. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 206. 
 King James. — 
 
 Scott, 208-9. 
 Murder. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 206. 
 War.— 
 
 Byron, 205-6. 
 Theological. — 
 Blood.— 
 
 Shakspeare, 193. 
 Devotion. — 
 
 Young, 193. 
 Divine Love. — 
 
 Solomon's Song, 192-3. 
 Futurity. — 
 
 Young, 193. 
 Soul. — 
 
 Rousseau, 193. 
 Sun. — 
 
 Young, 193. 
 Vengeance. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 193. 
 Social. — 
 Age.— 
 
 Shakspeare, 202. 
 Character. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Tennyson, 194. 
 Content. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 203. 
 Cunning. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 204. 
 Delight. — 
 
 Bowring's Maygar Poems, 203. 
 Dying. — 
 
 Eastman, 205. 
 
INDEX. 415 
 
 Friendship. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 196. 
 Grief. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 203. 
 Hand. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 196. 
 Indecision. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 196. 
 Love. — 
 
 Marlowe, 198; Shakspeare, 198-9, 200; Anon., 201. 
 Loveliness. — 
 
 Leyden, 196-7 ; Anonymous, Herrick, Trench, 197 ; 
 Byron, 197-8. 
 Mind. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 202. 
 Misfortune. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 201. 
 Murder. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 204. 
 Music. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 204. 
 Rage. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 204. 
 Rich Parents. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 193-4. 
 Riot.— 
 
 Shakspeare, 202. 
 Stature. — 
 
 Pope, 203-4. 
 Tears. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 202. 
 The Past. — 
 
 Byron, 204. 
 Woman. — 
 
 Scott, Moore, Shakspeare, 201. 
 Youth. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Kennedy's Poets of Spain, 194 ; 
 Philips, 195 ; Bowring's Magyar Poetry, 195-6. 
 External and Human Nature. — 
 
 Ben Jonson, 205. 
 
 Humboldt on the fear that a more intimate 
 knowledge of Nature may lessen the charm and 
 magic of her power, 36, 52, 53 ; enjoyment in the 
 contemplation of Nature, 69, 70 ; the existence 
 and non-existence of a feeling of Nature in 
 Ancient Poetry, 51 ; on the Feeling of Nature in 
 Ancient Poetry, 154. 
 
41 6 INDEX. 
 
 IMAGINATION AND FANCY, 258-333. 
 
 Literary. — 
 The Poet.— 
 
 Raverty's Afghan Poetry, Rousseau's Persian Poetr}% 
 311; Shakspeare, 311-12; Shelley, Wordsworth, 
 Longfellow, Scott, 312. 
 Words. — 
 
 Horace (Bagot's), 313. 
 Romance. — 
 
 Tennyson, 313-14. 
 Indian Legends. — 
 Longfellow, 314-15. 
 
 Metaphysical. — 
 Apathy. — 
 
 Raverty's Afghan Poetry, 309. 
 Fancy. — 
 
 Warton, 309-10; Keats, 310. 
 Memory. — 
 
 Moore, Shakspeare, Burns, 311. 
 Mind. — 
 
 Byron, Shelley, 309. 
 Musing. — 
 
 Byron, 310; Shelley, 310-11. 
 Nature. — 
 
 Arnold, 308-9. 
 Soul. — 
 
 Arnold, 308. 
 
 Political. — 
 War.— 
 
 Shakspeare, Campbell, 331. 
 Treachery . — 
 
 Bowring's Batavian Poetry, 332. 
 Religious and Moral. — 
 Brevity. — 
 
 Raverty's Afghan Poetry, 324. 
 Carnal Heart. — 
 
 Raverty's Afghan Poetry, 317. 
 
 Compassion. — 
 
 Rousseau's Persian Literature, 319 
 
 Change. — 
 
 Raverty's Afghan Poetry, 325. 
 
 Decay. — 
 
 Raverty's Afghan Poetry, 324. 
 
 Decision. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 319. 
 
INDEX. 417 
 
 Deceitful. — 
 
 Job, 317. 
 Departed. — 
 
 Scott, Wordsworth, 330; Moore, 330-1. 
 Desires. — 
 
 Raverty's Afghan Poetry, Gray, 320. 
 Dissolution. — 
 
 Job, Bowring's Poetry of Spain, Byron, Moore, 
 323 ; Shelley, 323-4. 
 Divine Love. — 
 
 Solomon's Song, Psalms of David, 315. 
 Evanescence. — 
 
 Job, 325 ; Psalms, 325-6 ; Cary's Dante, Raverty's 
 Afghan Poetry, Bowring's Poetry of Spain, 326 ; 
 Shakspeare, 326-7; King, Dr. H. Dyer, Herrick, 
 327 ; Burns, 327-8 ; Bidlake, Bowring's Russian 
 Poets, 328 ; Shelley, Clarke, Wastell, 329. 
 Friendship. — 
 
 Moore, 318. 
 Futurity. — 
 
 Watts, Raverty's Afghan Poetry, 324. 
 Hope.— 
 
 Rousseau's Persian Literature, Schiller (Lord 
 Derby's), 318. 
 Humble. — 
 
 Raverty's Afghan Poetry, 319. 
 Illusion. — 
 
 Goldsmith, 325. 
 Insensibility. — 
 
 Keats, Moore, 319. 
 
 Moore, 318. 
 Mercy. — 
 
 Psalms of David, 316. 
 Obscurity. — 
 
 Gray, 320. 
 Peace. — 
 
 Gisborne, 318. 
 Promises. — 
 
 Raverty's Afghan Poetry, 320. 
 Self -Evident. — 
 
 Job, 317. 
 The Creator's Power. — 
 
 Marvell, 316. 
 The Gay. — 
 
 Milton, 320-1. 
 
 2 E 
 
41 8 INDEX. 
 
 The Impossible. — 
 
 Raverty's Afghan Poetry, 324. 
 The Pensive.— 
 
 Milton, 321-2-3. 
 The Wise. — 
 
 Rousseau's Persian Literature, 316; Bowring's 
 Magyar Poetry, 316-17. 
 Time. — 
 
 Gascoigne, Newton, 317 ; Shelley, 317-18. 
 Calm. — 
 
 Wordsworth, 306. 
 Fairy Feast. — 
 
 Herrick, 304-5. 
 Female Beauty. — 
 
 Oxenford's French Songs, 289; Song (Henry IV.), 
 Sir P. Sidney, Shakspeare, 290; Raverty's 
 Afghan Poetry, 290-1 ; Carlyle's Arabian Poetry, 
 Thomson, Moore, 291 ; Tennyson, 291-2 ; Spen- 
 ser, 292. 
 Friendship. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Moore, 306. 
 Grief. — 
 
 Goldsmith, 306; Moore, Wordsworth, 307. 
 Love. — 
 
 Spenser, 293 ; Shakspeare, 283-4 ; Sir T. Wiat, 
 294 ; T. Carew, 294-5 > Marlowe, Sir W. Jones's 
 Translation, Chodzki's Persian Poetry, 295 ; 
 Bowring's Magyar Poetry, 296 ; Bowring's Poetry 
 of Spain, 296-7-8; Alger's Poetry of the East, 
 Sylvester, 298 ; Anon., 298-9; Oxenford's French 
 Songs, Dulcken's German Songs, Shelley, 299 ; 
 Keats, Joanna Baillie, Byron, 300 ; Moore, 300-1 ; 
 Montgomery, 301 ; Tennyson, 301-2-3. 
 Marriage. — 
 
 Beaumont and Fletcher, 305-6. 
 Rest.— 
 
 Moore, 307. 
 Retreat. — 
 
 Tennyson, 303-4. 
 Sleep. — 
 
 Keats, Noel, 307 ; Hogg, 308. 
 Voice. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Moore, 303. 
 Watching. — 
 
 Cary's Dante, 292 ; Keats, 292-3. 
 Wavering Love. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Bowring's Bohemian Poetry, 303. 
 
INDEX. 419 
 
 Wine. — 
 
 Rousseau's Persian Poetry, Moore, 305. 
 
 Universe. — 
 Action. — 
 
 Scott, 288-9. 
 Birds. — 
 
 Gary's Dante, Shelley, 284. 
 Bees. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Byron, 284. 
 Calm. — 
 
 Byron, Tennyson, 269 ; Moore, 270. 
 Clouds. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 271 ; Shelley, 272. 
 Death. — 
 
 Home, Bryant, 289, 
 Earth. — 
 
 Schiller, 267. 
 Fire. — 
 
 Cary's Dante, Lambert, 272. 
 Flowers. — 
 
 Barry Cornwall, 286 ; Wordsworth, 286-7. 
 Isle. — 
 
 Shelley, 276. 
 Lightning. — 
 
 Lambert, 272. 
 Man. — 
 
 Psalms of David, Shakspeare, Burns, Moore, 288. 
 Moon, &*c. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Schiller (Lambert's), Longfellow, 266. 
 Morning. — 
 
 Home, Byron, 268 ; Moore, 268-9. 
 Motion. — 
 
 Shelley, 287 ; David Grant, 287-8. 
 Nature. — 
 
 Shelley, 262-3 '> Cunningham, Bowring's Russian 
 Poets, Oxenford's French Songs, 264 ; Byron, 
 264-5 ; Tennyson, 265. 
 Night. — 
 
 Longfellow, 271. 
 Ocean. — 
 
 Byron, 274 ; Tennyson, 275. 
 Perfume. — 
 
 Moore, 287. 
 Rainbow. — 
 
 Campbell, 272 ; Lambert, 270. 
 
 2 E 2 
 
42 O INDEX. 
 
 Seasons. — 
 
 Milton, Spenser, 276 ; Willis, Moore, Hemans, 
 Longfellow, 277 ; Shelley, 277-8 ; Cowper, 278-9; 
 Campbell, 279 ; Shelley, 279-80. 
 Sound. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Barry Cornwall, Thomson, 271 ; Shelley, 
 Moore, Byron, 273. 
 Storm. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 280. 
 Stars. — 
 
 Kirke White, Keats, 267 ; Campbell, Moore, 
 Byron, 268. 
 Sun, S--c. — 
 
 Cary's Dante, 265 ; Moore, 266. 
 Trees. — 
 Campbell, 284-5 ; Akenside, Moore, Cary's Dante, 
 Horace Smith, 285 ; Spenser, 286. 
 Truth.— 
 
 Shakspeare, Moore, 288. 
 Unstable. — 
 
 Shelley, 281 ; Drummond, Shakspeare, Bowring's 
 Batavian Poetry, 282 ; Taylor's German Poetry, 
 282-3 5 Thomson, Campbell, Shelley, 283. 
 Water.— 
 Cary's Dante, 273-4; Bowring's Poetry of Spain, 
 Keats, 274. 
 Kingsley, Rev. Charles. The Mystic, the true Interpreter 
 
 of Nature, 31-38. 
 Lasting, 403. 
 
 Lyric Poets and the world of Nature, 5. 
 Lucretius. De Natura Berum, 4. 
 Macaulay, example of his use of metaphor, 93; his use of 
 
 figurative language, 87-8. 
 Max Miiller. Nature incapable of progress or improvement, 
 54» 55> 5 6 J on metaphor, 85. 
 
 MEDITATIVE, RELIGIOUS, MORAL, AND SERIOUS 
 POETRY, 211-257. 
 
 Apostrophe. — 
 Heaven. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 214. 
 Moon. — 
 
 Ossian, 213. 
 Mountains. — 
 
 Bowring's Poetry of Bohemia, 214; Scott, 215-16. 
 Martial Faith. — 
 
 Scott, 215. 
 
INDEX. 421 
 
 y at nre. — 
 
 Brooke's Universal Nature, 214; Thomson, 215. 
 Trees. — 
 
 Bowring's Poetry of Spain, 214* 
 Winds. — 
 
 Shelley, 215, 
 Association, — 
 A Pass. — 
 
 Wordsworth, 220, 
 Action. — 
 
 Dulcken's German Songs, 217-18. 
 Alps.— 
 
 Wiat, SirT., 216, 
 Autumn. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 216, 
 Blue. — 
 
 Dulcken's German Songs, 217. 
 Bright Scene. — 
 
 Moore, 220. 
 Change. — 
 
 Scott, 219. 
 Daisy. — 
 
 Montgomery, 218, 
 Fire. — 
 
 Cary's Dante, 216 ; Raverty's Afghan Poetry, 216. 
 Graveyard. — 
 
 Tennyson, 221-2, 
 Groves. — 
 
 Milton, 222-3. 
 Human Nature. — 
 
 Wordsworth, 220-1. 
 Leaf. — 
 
 Cary's Dante, 216. 
 Moonlight. — 
 
 Scott, 219-20. 
 Morning. — 
 
 Gray, 223-4. 
 Nature. — 
 
 Beattie, 217. 
 Poplars. — 
 
 Cowper, 218. 
 Rose. — 
 
 Scott, 218. 
 Snow. — 
 
 Byron, 220. 
 Sound. — 
 
 Wordsworth, 220. 
 
422 INDEX. 
 
 The East. — 
 
 Gay, 224. 
 Thistle. — 
 
 Burns, 219. 
 Wing. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 222. 
 Comparative. — 
 Animals. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Raverty's Afghan Poetry, 235 ; Scott, 
 236. 
 Birds. — 
 
 Cary's Dante, Creech's Lucretius, Shakspeare, 
 
 235- 
 Corn. — 
 
 Job, Lord Derby's Homer, 234. 
 Deity. — 
 
 Psalms of David, Bowling's Russian Poets, 224-5 > 
 Cowper, 225. 
 Fish.— 
 
 Cary's Dante, 230. 
 Hornet. — 
 
 Raverty's Afghan Poetry, 235. 
 Morning. — 
 
 Bowring's Poetry of Spain, 227. 
 Nature. — 
 
 Bowring's Russian Poets, 225-6. 
 Plants. — 
 
 Anonymous, (Paraphrase of Job), 232 ; Shakspeare, 
 Psalms of David, 1st Epistle of St. Peter, Gray, 
 Cary's Dante, 233. 
 Poison. — 
 
 Creech's Lucretius, 234. 
 Reptiles. — 
 
 Cary's Dante, 235. 
 Rock.— 
 
 Lord Derby's Homer, Raverty's Afghan Poetry, 
 Shakspeare, 230. 
 Rose. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 232. 
 Serpents. — 
 
 Creech's Lucretius, 234. 
 Snow. — 
 
 Job, Lord Derby's Homer, Shakspeare, 234. 
 Sun. — 
 
 Cary's Dante, 226 ; Shakspeare, 226-7. 
 Time. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Scott, 226. 
 
INDEX. 423 
 
 Trees. — 
 
 Psalms of David, 230-1 ; Job, Lord Derby's Homer, 
 Jonson, 231 ; Shakspeare, 231-2. 
 Violet.— 
 
 Wordsworth, 252. 
 Water.— 
 Job, Lord Derby's Homer, Shakspeare, 229 ; Scott, 
 229-30. 
 Wind, Air. — 
 Job, Psalms of David, 227 ; Lord Derby's Homer, 
 227, 8 ; Cary's Dante, Shakspeare, Milton, 228 ; 
 Scott, 228, 9. 
 Winter. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 230. 
 Meditative. — 
 Creation. — 
 
 Watts, Habington, 243. 
 Death. — 
 
 Habington, 252. 
 Decay. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Armstrong, 249 ; Barry Cornwall, 
 249-50; Tennyson, 250-1-2. 
 Flowers. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Herrick, 255 ; Kirke White, 255-6 ; 
 Byron, Hood, Wordsworth, 256; Tennyson, 
 256-7. 
 Herds. — 
 
 Pope, 254. 
 Italy.— 
 
 Addison, 246, 7. 
 Morn. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Gray, 247. 
 Nature. — 
 
 Stillingfleet, 243-4 ; Brooke, Smollet, Gray, 
 Cowper, 244; Shelley, 244-5; Schiller, (Lord 
 Derby's Translation), 245 ; Arnold, 245-6. 
 Scenery. — 
 
 Scott, 246. 
 Seasons. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Drummond, Habington, 247 ; Gray, 
 248. 
 Subtilty. — 
 
 Creech's Lucretius, 252. 
 Shapes. — 
 
 Creech's Lucretius, 252-3. 
 Time. — 
 
 Creech's Lucretius, 248; Shakspeare, 248-9. 
 
424 INDEX. 
 
 Trees.— 
 
 Cowley, Pope, Leyden, 254; Southey, 254-5 ; Lord 
 Derby's Translations from French, 255. 
 Water. — 
 
 Creech's Lucretius, Cowper, Logan, 253. 
 World.— 
 
 Shakspeare, 247. 
 
 Reflective. — 
 Cloud. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 237. 
 Flint. — 
 
 Scott, 239. 
 Flowers. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 240-1. Hurdis, Wesley, 241. 
 Frost. — 
 
 Shakspeare, Chodzko's Poetry of Persia, 241. 
 Heat. — 
 
 Creek's Lucretius, 237-8. 
 Insects. — 
 
 Proverbs of Solomon, (Herder,) Ecclesiasticus, 
 Pope, 242. 
 Lambs. — 
 
 Bloomfield, 242. 
 Light.— 
 
 Moore, 237. 
 Lightning.-*- 
 
 Bowring's Poetry of Spain, Shakspeare, Scott, 237. 
 Moon. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 237. 
 Morning. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 238. 
 Night. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 238. Moore, 238-9. 
 Seasons. — 
 
 Doddridge, Shakspeare, 240. 
 Scenery. — 
 
 Warton, Campbell, 239. Scott, 240. 
 Space. — 
 
 Creech's Lucretius, 237. 
 Stars. — 
 
 Howell (J.), 237. 
 Strea?ns. — 
 
 Creech's Lucretius, Shakspeare, Tennant, 239. 
 Sun. — 
 
 Creech's Lucretius, Raverty's Afghan Poetry, Shakes- 
 peare, Moore, 236. Wordsworth, 236-7. 
 
INDEX, 425 
 
 Water.— 
 
 Creech's Lucretius, 239. 
 Wind. — 
 Job, Habingtpn, 238. 
 
 Metaphor, the use of, 93, 97. Examples from Macaulay, 
 93 ; Ossian, 94 ; the Sacred Writings, 95. Classifi- 
 cation of Epithets, 96. 
 
 Metrical Hymns, examples of, 366-7. 
 
 Mysteries, 394-5-6. 
 
 Moir (Delta), his opinions of Pope, 1 13-14 ; on the cur- 
 tailment of the poetical province by scientific pro- 
 gress, 34, 35, and 39 ; Poets who will not view Nature 
 with the unassisted eye, 62 ; on Wordsworth, 68 ; 
 on the invariable principles of Poetry, 251. 
 
 Moore, Wordsworth, Southey, Wilson, their treatment 
 of Natural Objects, 65-7. 
 
 Moore, Vision of Philosophy, 50. 
 
 Nature, in reference to ancient study, 1 ; as regarded by 
 superficial observers, 2 ; or, the intellectual, and the 
 mental world, 3 ; its study unnoticed by Horace, 3 ; 
 Addison's idea of additions to, n ; described by Dr. 
 Blacklock, although blind, 11 ; Arnold's views of inter- 
 preting, 27, 28; unsatisfactory, 28, 29 ; described as 'a 
 book', 32 ; its language, speech, and teachings, 33 ; 
 Emerson's estimate of, 33 ; Ruskin's remarks on ' seeing,' 
 34 ; Humboldt's opinion of science enlarging views of, 
 36, 52, 53 ; in descriptive poetry, 37-40 ; applied typically, 
 as noted by Ruskin, 42; Professor Bain on comparisons 
 derived from, 43, 44 ; its comprehensive character, 45 ; 
 poetical notices of, by Beattie, Thomson, Burns, Words- 
 worth, and Byron, 46, 47; and Art, their influence con- 
 trasted, 48; as viewed by T. Campbell, 53,54; various 
 opinions respecting, 56 : Boyle's Essay on, 56 ; defined 
 to be all, not Art, 57 ; on poetical reality, or truth to, 60 ; 
 insight into, ' a gift,' 60 ; Bowles on the true poet of,6i ; 
 Coleridge on the Beautiful in, 61 , Moir's strictures on 
 certain poetical aspirants, 62 ; novelty in, advocated by 
 De Quincey, 64 ; Humboldt on striking scenes and 
 phenomena of, 69, 70 ; Images, &c, from, collected by 
 Dr. Southey, 72-76 ; remarks on Dr. Southey's collection, 
 76, 77 ; remarks on and examples of Wordsworth's 
 study of, 77-80 ; no definite study of, 81 ; the scientific 
 and the poetical study of, 82, 83 ; evidence illustrative 
 of past and present use of, 84, 85 ; metaphors derived 
 from, 85, 86 ; as affecting language in Macaulay's 
 History of England, 88 ; also in his Essays, 88 ; the same 
 in Carlyle's Address, 89 ; likewise C. Dickens's Old 
 
426 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Curiosity Shop, 89-91 ; and Gladstone's Chapter of Auto- 
 biography, gi t 92 ; its influence on language, 97 ; Thom- 
 son's lines on, 150 ; its lessons, 188 ; action, a law of, 
 287 ; the poet's attention to the small and evanescent in, 
 332 ; Negative, and non-natural views of, 334-365 ; 
 exceptional poetical views of, 366-374 ; failure of 
 attempts to spiritualize, 336 ; inverted, 347 ; religious 
 writers, 368 ; is one grand mystery, 375 ; beauty in, 376 ; 
 has a transition state, 376 ; weakness of criticism 
 applied to the wonderful works of Creation, 376 ; the 
 spiritual associated by some critics with, 386 ; applica- 
 tions of, 390 ; duality in, 392 ; poetical illustrative 
 extracts relating to, 214, 217, 225, 243, 262, 308. 
 
 Naples, lines on, 161. 
 
 Nature and Art, a controversy respecting, 11. 
 
 Natural History recommended for the poet's study, 9 ; 
 poetical zoology criticized, 10 ; applied by Dr. Aikin to 
 poetry, 15 ; zoology recommended by Dr. Newell, 17 ; 
 Dr. Darwin's Botanic Garden, 155, 157. 
 
 Nature, Human, an absorbing study, 6 ; an independent 
 and important study, 175, 210 ; and external nature, 205. 
 
 Nature-Study, deficient in classical and early English 
 poetry, 5 ; artificially pursued by early poets, 6 ; a 
 popular view of its character and pursuit, 8 ; as it has been 
 hitherto pursued, 59 ; its deficiency in English poetry for 
 75 years, 20 ; whence its stores are derived, as an art, 69 ; 
 want of system, 81 ; its difficulties suggested, 82 ; 
 systematic study urged, 82; generalization, an elementary 
 step, 83, 386 ; replete with common-places, and subli- 
 mities, 84; commences with visible forms, 113 ; introduc- 
 tion to, 375 ; the poet's province in, 379 ; particularization 
 in, a secondary process, 386 ; the language of, 389 ; its 
 pursuit to assist imagination and fancy, 399. 
 
 Nautilus, lines on the, 143. 
 
 NEGATIVE VIEWS OF NATURE, 334-365. 
 
 Apostrophe. — 
 To Death. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 338-40. 
 Bombast and Irony. — 
 Nature Inverted. — ■ 
 
 Pope, 347-8. 
 The Morn. — 
 Butler, 347. 
 Fable, &c. 
 
 Flint and Steel. — 
 
 Kennedy's Poets of Spain, 351. 
 
INDEX. 427 
 
 Forest and Floods. — 
 
 Esdras, 350. 
 The Almighty. — 
 
 Esdras, 350-1. 
 Hyperbole. 
 Army. — 
 
 Lord Derby's Homer, 343. 
 A Mob.— 
 
 Shakspeare, 346. 
 Blood. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 345. 
 Ccesar. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 345. 
 Discord. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 345. 
 Love. — 
 
 Truths Integrity (Early Ballad), 344. 
 Love's Wishes. — 
 
 Oxenford's French Songs, 346-7. 
 Memorial. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 344-5. 
 Ocean Grave. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 345. 
 Orpheus. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 346. 
 Speed. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 346. 
 Submission. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 346. 
 Triumph. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 346. 
 Proverbs. — 
 Dreams. — 
 
 Ecclesiasticus, 348. 
 
 Greek Proverbs, 348-9. 
 
 Persian Proverbs, 349. 
 
 Proverbs from the Greek, 348-9. 
 
 Hindostanee Proverb, 349. 
 Night. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 349. 
 
 Proverbs from Rabelais, 350. 
 
 Proverbs from Swift's Gulliver, 350. 
 Satire. — 
 A Critic- — 
 
 Shelley, 341. 
 Brute Nature. — 
 
 Swift (J.), 340. 
 
4^8 INDEX. 
 
 Critics. — 
 
 Pope, 341. 
 Dulness. — 
 
 Pope, 342. 
 Prey, Vermin. — 
 
 Swift (J.), 340-1. 
 Robbery. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 343. 
 The Book-Worm. — 
 
 Parnell, 340. 
 The Stoics. — 
 
 Butler, 342. 
 Woman. — 
 
 Anon, 342. 
 
 Typical, etc. 
 Belief.— 
 
 Wesley, 354. 
 Contrasts. — 
 
 Bowring's Magyar Poetry, 354. 
 Golden Age. — 
 
 Herder's Hebrew Poetry, 352. 
 Intercourse. — 
 Milton, 353. 
 Love. — 
 
 Southwell, Dr. T. Lodge, 358; Ben Jonson, 358-g ; 
 Cartwright, Habington, Shakspeare, 359 ; Burns, 
 359-60; Campbell, Scott, 360. 
 Mind. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 354. 
 Non-Natural. — 
 
 Thomson's Sales Attici, Creech's Lucretius, Alger's 
 Eastern Poetry, Milton, Shakspeare, 355 ; Bow- 
 ring's Russian Poets, Byron, 356. 
 Seasonable. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 353. 
 Self -Deception. — 
 
 Shakspeare, 354. 
 The Almighty. — 
 
 Herder's Hebrew Poetry, 352. 
 The Impossible. — 
 
 Ecclesiasticus, Horace (Lord Derby's), Alger's 
 Eastern Poetry, Raverty's Afghan Poetry, 356 ; 
 Ashmole, 356-7 ; Shakspeare, 357-8. 
 The Unsearchable. — ■ 
 
 Herrick, 353. 
 The Universe. — 
 
 Herder's Hebrew Poetry, 351-2. 
 
INDEX 429 
 
 Wisdom's Glory. — 
 Ecclesiasticus, 352-3. 
 
 Newell, R. H. The Zoology of the English Poets, 17. 
 
 Night scene in the Countess of Winchelsea's Nocturnal 
 Reverie, 18; described by Dryden, 19. 
 
 Nocturnal Reverie, by Countess of Winchelsea, 119-20. 
 
 Non-Natural, 355 ; examples of its application, 363 ; its 
 misapplication, 363-4 ; appropriate use in Hebrew- 
 poetry, and as applied by Shakspeare, 364 ; misapplied 
 by Thomson, 372-3. 
 
 Novelty in Nature advocated by De Quincey, 64. 
 
 Oersted, Hans C. On the relation between Natural Science 
 and Poetry, 12. 
 
 Ossian. Metaphorical expressions from, 94. 
 
 Particularization, 391-2-3-4. 
 
 Perfection, 403. 
 
 Platitudes, amusing use of, 371. 
 
 Proverbs, examples from Book of Job, 103 ; Thomson's 
 Salis Attici, 103-4-5 ; Roebuck's Persian Proverbs, 105 ; 
 Turkish Proverbs, 105, 6 ; Raverty's Afghan Proverbs, 
 106 ; Shakspeare, 106-7-8 ; Maunder's Treasury of Know- 
 ledge, 108-9; Bonn's Handbook of Proverbs, 109-10; 
 Analysis of Proverbs, 110-11. 
 
 Analysis of, 110-11. 
 
 Ancient and Modern, 98-1 11. 
 
 associating the mental faculties with the material 
 
 world, 400-1. 
 
 from the Greek, 348. 
 
 ■ from the Persian, 349. 
 
 from Rabelais, 350. 
 
 from Swift, 350. 
 
 Proverbial Philosophy, 100-102. 
 
 Rees' Cyclopaedia, on the study of Nature for Poetical 
 
 purposes, 8, 11. 
 Ruskin. On the first observance of Nature, 34; Typical 
 
 applications of Nature, 42. 
 Saint Pierre's Harmonies of Nature, 13 ; Human 
 
 Harmonies of Plants, 14 ; Studies of N attire, 13. 
 Satirical Poets and the world of Nature, 5. 
 Schiller. The Greek Poet a faithful exponent of Nature, 
 
 51-2. 
 Shakspeare. Truthfulness in dealing with natural objects, 
 
 19. 
 Shairp, Professor. On Wordsworth's love and appreciation 
 
 of Nature, 30-1 ; requirements of the Poet as an inter- 
 preter of Nature, 38. 
 
43° INDEX. 
 
 Southey. Notes from Common-Place Book on Nature, 
 71-6. 
 
 Speed, 402-3. 
 
 Strength, 403. 
 
 Taylor. On the Excursion, 368. 
 
 Taylor, Henry. Wordsworth's love of Nature, 22-3. 
 
 Tennyson, 26; In Memoriam — sometimes misty and 
 unmeaning, 336-7. 
 
 Thomson. Examples of the non-natural from the Seasons, 
 372-3 ; invocation to Nature, 150 ; on the difficulty of 
 painting Nature, 46-7. 
 
 Time, 394. 
 
 Tupper's Proverbial Philosophy, 100-102. 
 
 Ugliness, 368-9-70. 
 
 Violet. Epithets applied to, 397-8. 
 
 Virgil's Georgics, 4. 
 
 Welsh Triads, the, in reference to the poetical character, 7. 
 
 Whately, Dr. Novelty in metaphor, 49. 
 
 Wilson, Professor. Defence of Burns as an observer of 
 Nature, 61. 
 
 Wordsworth, his remarks on the dearth of Nature-Study, 18; 
 strictures on Dryden, 18, 54; and on Pope, 18; observa- 
 tions in his Preface, 20; opinions expressed in The 
 Excursion, 21; not clear to commentators, 22; noticed 
 by H. Taylor, 22; estimation of his poetical style, 24; 
 treatment of the small or minute, 25, 26; Prof. Shairp's 
 opinion of his poetry, 30 ; De Quincey's critical essay on, 
 62, 64; De Quincey's six special notices of, 63, 64; his 
 lines on cattle grazing, 64; Moir's remarks on, 65, 68; 
 The Prelude, remarks on, 67 ; quoted 261 ; his critics 
 named, 67 ; is philosophy mythical, 67 ; remarks on and 
 examples of his study of Nature, 77-80 ; his method of 
 studying Nature problematical, 81 ; censures the cold, 
 dry style, 113. 
 
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